The New Orleans Pelicans take on the Spurs in a do-or-die matchup.
The New Orleans Pelicans are still playing meaningful games, but that will be over if they don’t get a win against the San Antonio Spurs.
San Antonio has been one of the most surprising teams since the games resumed, as they’ve changed their style after the roster was hit with some big losses.
When we learned in early June that LaMarcus Aldridge would not be playing after getting surgery on his shoulder, it was easy to think the Spurs had no chance at reaching the play-in games.
Aldridge is the team leader in rebounds and blocks and second on the team in minutes and points and the loss of that much production is hard for any team to overcome.
Instead of trying to shoehorn players into Aldridge’s roll, head coach Gregg Popovich changed the way he utilizes lineups.
He went small, moving DeMar DeRozan to the power forward position and playing the trifecta of Derrick White, Dejounte Murray, and Lonnie Walker in starting lineups.
The three young guards didn’t play together very much during the regular season, as DeRozan has played small forward most of the time that he’s on the floor. It’s not just “positional” changes that have caused the Spurs to play beyond expectations.
During the regular season, the Spurs played two different styles depending on who was on the floor. When Aldridge and DeRozan were in the team didn’t shoot from beyond the arc very often, instead choosing to play a more 90’s style of offense where most of the attempts were from the midrange or near the rim.
With the two stars out of the lineup, the Spurs would transition to a modern offense that launches threes far more frequently and treated a midrange two like it was poison.
When we look at the New Orleans Pelicans, it’s hard to not feel like the season is over and that Pelicans’ fans will be treated to another disappointment. Though the team is just one game behind Portland for ninth, the Trailblazers have looked far more impressive in their games.
A loss today would see the heat under head coach Alvin Gentry’s seat turned up even higher as fans have been calling for his departure from the team for a couple of years now.
Spoiling what seemed to be a ready-made playoff berth might make it impossible for David Griffin to ignore the pitchfork holding mob outside.
The New Orleans Pelicans are -3 point favorites in this game. To me, that’s about right but I can understand why 58% of the public bets are being made on the Spurs.
This Pelicans team hasn’t looked very sharp defensively in the bubble and now the Spurs are trotting out a totally different style of play than what New Orleans saw from them in January.
What can we learn from the previous matchups?