The New Orleans Pelicans have sucked me in once again.
They’ve been up and down all season and I’ve counted them out more times than I can remember.
But the brilliance of Zion Williamson coupled with the poor play of the teams battling it out at the bottom of the Western Conference have kept the Pels’ slim playoff hopes alive.
The Pels will be put to the test tonight against the Kings who were actually ahead of the Pelicans in the standings before their current six-game losing streak.
If the Pelicans continue to win, then just about every game from here until the end will be the “most important” starting tonight against the Sacramento Kings.
Here is what is at stake when the Kings enter the Smoothie King Center.
The New Orleans Pelicans have to prove it against bad teams
One of the Pels’ biggest problems this year is that they haven’t been able to string together wins against bad teams. They’ve been solid against the good teams but have often played down to the competition against the bad ones.
The Kings have lost six-in-a-row, are 12th in the West and have the worst defense in the NBA, so they definitely qualify as a bad team.
The Pels struggled to barely beat an injured Cleveland Cavaliers team last night and needed another monster effort from Zion Williamson to get it done.
The Pelicans will be on the second game of a back-to-back and have not played particularly well against the Kings the last few seasons, so it won’t be easy tonight in New Orleans.
The trick-or-treat Pelicans have sucked me in all season, usually just to lose to a bad team and quickly diminish all hope, which is what they need to avoid against the Kings at home.