Blown leads and close games dooming the Pelicans

The New Orleans Pelicans have been unable to maintain leads, a problem they have had dating back to last season. It happened against the Celtics on Monday afternoon, when the Pels blew an 18-point first-half lead to a mediocre Boston team.

This is one of the traits of young teams, as they can play well enough to build a lead in spurts, but often lack what it takes to keep it.

The Pelicans have lost 11 games this season by 10 points or fewer and six games in which they had a double-digit lead and blew it. Last season, they had 14 games where they blew double-digit leads, so this problem is not new.

They are on pace to do that again, maybe even surpass it. If they could maintain a double-digit lead, their record would be drastically different. We are talking about a difference that puts them into the playoff conversation.

One of the problems is pace. The Pelicans tend to build leads (especially at home) by getting steals and turnovers and converting them into points on the other end. But something happens when they get a lead, as they suddenly revert to isolation play as if they think they can just run out the clock.

They need to be more aggressive when they get leads and try to put teams away instead of letting them chip away at the lead.

Maintaining double-digit leads may be hard to do, but keeping the same pace of play will help, as they often grind to a halt in the half court and go away from the up-tempo play that got them the lead in the first place.

These are things the younger guys will learn with experience, as no lead is safe in the NBA and you can’t stop being aggressive just because you get up big early on.