Is Zion Williamson playing tonight versus the San Antonio Spurs?

The New Orleans Pelicans host the San Antonio Spurs tonight at 8:00 PM Eastern Standard Time. And once again, just as they have for their last 34 games prior, the team will do so without its best player, Zion Williamson.

The bad news is obvious. The Pelicans have now been without their best player for nearly 60 percent of their games (he’ll have only appeared in 29 of 72 contests if you count tonight’s absence). Plus, his constant setbacks have created a growing angst amongst fans that Williamson may not return at all this year (a death sentence for the team’s hopes of winning a playoff series).

The good news, however, is also relatively apparent in this situation. First, the Pelicans’ opponent tonight is the Spurs – a team that not only owns the third-worst record in the league, but also has lost all three of its other games to New Orleans this year (although those circumstances haven’t stopped the Pelicans from choking before).

But even more important than the prestige of their opponent is today’s date. On March 8th, it was reported by ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski that Williamson would be out for at least two more weeks with the strained hamstring he suffered on January 2nd against the Philadelphia 76ers.

Two weeks from that report would be March 22nd, and today is March 21st. So, there is a good chance that any day now, we get an update on the latest timetable for Williamson’s return.

Who knows, maybe we get graced with some great news for a change and find out that Williamson will be ready to go for Thursday’s game against the Charlotte Hornets or Saturday’s against the Los Angeles Clippers.

As it stands, the Pelicans are one game behind the Utah Jazz, Oklahoma City Thunder, and Minnesota Timberwolves for the final spot in the NBA Play-In Tournament (to understand how the play-in works, check out this post here).

The Pelicans will also be missing the services of Jose Alvarado (tibia) and E.J. Liddell (knee) for tonight’s game. On February 28th, it was stated that Alvarado would be re-evaluated in three weeks. Based on that reporting (three weeks from the 28th is today), we should also be reserving an update on Alvarado’s potential return very soon.

All we can do, at this point, is refresh our Twitter feed and keep our fingers crossed.