Pelicans: 3 ways Brandon Ingram can improve under Stan Van Gundy

Lowering turnovers is another element of Brandon Ingram’s game that Stan Van Gundy can work on next season with the New Orleans Pelicans

Improvement #2- Lowering Brandon Ingram’s Turnovers

In Stan Van Gundy’s mind, turnovers are the key to winning basketball, you have to force the opponent to give the ball up to you, and make sure that you don’t give the ball to them. Last season, Brandon Ingram turned the ball over 3 times per game, and that won’t be accepted by Van Gundy.

Now, Van Gundy is a teacher and not a total disciplinarian though, and I see him helping Brandon Ingram fix this problem. The reason I see this, is because when you watch Pelicans games from last season, you’ll that Brandon Ingram turned the ball over a lot because he was trying to make something happen to win the game.

Often times, Ingram would be trying to force a pass to a player not in the best position to try and make up points, or he’d hold onto the ball looking to score himself and not give it up when the defense pressures him.

What Stan Van Gundy will do with Brandon Ingram is simplify the game for him, he’ll drill into Ingram in practice that there’s four other players on the court and he doesn’t always need to press for oppritunties. That teaching would allow him to learn just to make the pass that’s there and to pass to the open man as soon as the defense tries to pressure him.

This is important because if Ingram doesn’t improve this area to his game, opponents will continue to zero in on him and that’ll prevent Ingram from reaching his full potential. Of course reaching that full potential also relies on one other trait too.