GAME DAY (ish) - New Orleans Pelicans vs Orlando Magic - Preseason - 0-0

It's finally a Pelicans Gameday 👀

🏀: vs Magic
🕖: 7:00pm CT
📺: @BallySportsNO #Pelicans | @SmoothieKing pic.twitter.com/G9GVcf65DM

— New Orleans Pelicans (@PelicansNBA) October 10, 2023

The season is back - well, preseason. So the games aren't 'real' and they don't represent anything in particular. And we still have a bunch of injuries but we're the Pelicans so that's normal.

Expect the main guys to play but not for heavy minutes, as per this:

Monday's #Pelicans practice report (Starters will play Tuesday vs. Magic in home preseason opener, will log under 20 minutes each; Willie Green expects to use a dozen-plus players in @SmoothieKingCtr): https://t.co/ylrKzjRnq4 pic.twitter.com/pHo9hlSXnw

— Jim Eichenhofer (@Jim_Eichenhofer) October 9, 2023

So 15 minutes, maybe 20 at a push, is about what you should expect. Still, it will be good to see Ingram, Zion, and CJ all on court at the same time again. Rare sight.

Let's see how it goes - it's preseason so results are far less important than process, and of course we are missing figures like Trey, but I still want to see some signs of life.

3pt shooting have been real hot in these preseason games... i just want to see if we have the hot hand in 3pt shooting in our first 2 games..

�� pic.twitter.com/sCLmRnSv24

— New Orleans Pelicans (@PelicansNBA) October 10, 2023

Less than an hour away - lock in! ��

��: vs Magic
��: 7 pm CT
��: @BallySportsNO
��: @995WRNO pic.twitter.com/CoIhNX1IFE

— New Orleans Pelicans (@PelicansNBA) October 10, 2023

Like that pass attempt from BI, didn't work out but looking for those shots is going to be big this year

Zion goes for a drive into space and get wacked in the face - the more things change, the more they stay the same

That play was nice, Zion with the rebound in a crowd, then rockets a pass cross-court to Herb from beyond the half court line, and Herb drives to draw the and 1

Zion get a lot of these layups just rolling out of the rim, bad luck so far.

BI's stroke looked good on that 3. Loved the lack of hesitation.

Kira's first play of the game and he can't get the ball past the half court line without being stripped.

Then a BI turnover after a completely missed rotation.

Pels just losing it here.

Kira banks a three, he definitely called bank

BI misses the turnaround jumper and Kira tips it in

I know that 3pt shot didn't go, but I love BI taking it. Dyson puts it in on the offensive board after, also good.

Zion's in at the 5

I thought that play was dead about three different times but it ends up with a Zion and-1 dunk. Can't complain about the results.

Zion back to the line after Anthony Black fouls him on the alley. He's 3/3 from the line so far

Great pass from Zion, Magic fouls to prevent the Naji dunk

ZION

Threw the long range pass to Dyson who wasn't expecting it, ball fumbles, but Zion gets it back himself and puts up the FT line floater in traffic to hit the buzzer beater.

Borrego's influence is already showing. This offense is more spread out and the ball movement is looking vastly improved from last year.

Ho Hum!! One quarter in and JV is well over half way to another double - double. What's new?

Lots of good stuff in that first quarter to take away. Love Kira's activity so far, love BI's decision making, off-ball CJ is about right, JV's looked nice, and Zion's warming up.

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Originally Posted by ragincaucasian

Borrego's influence is already showing. This offense is more spread out and the ball movement is looking vastly improved from last year.

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The 3pt volume has me optimistic. One of our big issues last year was that we barely shot. Everyone's cited Borrego's focus on shooting more and thus far it's happened.

That was too easy. Zion skip pass from the post to Hawkins in the corner who nails a three - no defender within 6 feet.

Zion draws the foul on a fadeaway jumper, back to the line.

Zion with a little push shot/weird jump hook over Jonathan Isaac lmao

Herb nails the corner three off the Zion drive and dish.

It's just motoring along offensively right now.

Currently shooting 60% from the field...45.5% from 3....91% from the line.

With this offense and HEALTH we can do anything....

Herb with another corner 3, this time contested.

If he's going to shoot the corner 3 well this year, it's all over.

Hoping we can cut out shots like that, where possible.

BI with the finish

Ingram with a huge putback off the Hawkins miss

Defense falling apart a bit with all this rushing, see if they can bring that back in after the timeout

Incredibly broken play but it ended with BI FTs so I'll take it I guess?

A 41 point second quarter for Magic...NOT GOOD. Three players in our starting lineup cannot play defense off the dribble. I see players doing a lot of chasing and playing flat-footed.

Halftime

Zion: 12pts, 5rbs, 5asts on 72.6%TS - 15 minutes
BI: 14pts, 4rbds, 2asts, on 57.9%TS - 17 minutes
CJ: 12pts, 1rbds, 1asts on 66.2%TS - 16 minutes
JV: 7pts, 11rbds, /2asts on 57.0%TS - 18 minutes
Herb: 11pts, 5rbds, on 78.1%TS - 16 minutes

Don't expect too many second half minutes from these guys, they're already coming close to that 20 minute limit mentioned yesterday.

Pros from first half: great ball movement, better general shot profile, offense looks great with Zion at the 5, Kira looked way better than last year, defense was good in spots.

Cons from first half: Defense was also awful in spots (though funnily enough, not always when you'd expect it), and there's clearly a bit of scheme confusion on defense in those moments; guys sometimes look like they aren't sure where to be.

First half impressions:

- Zion is so clearly the best player on the Pelicans it's not close. And he's probably at 50% of where he was at last December.

- their defense is driven by their offense. When they get buckets, they also get stops.

- I like how JV was involved

— Shamit Dua (@FearTheBrown) October 11, 2023

So happy to finally see EJ out there

He's had a few moments here and there but overall Kira looks so much better than last year it's incredible

I know this will come as no surprise to anyone, but a Pelicans team with no Zion, BI, JV, CJ, or Trey is having trouble scoring.

Dyson looking a little better as this goes on

They got some stuff to work on.

Only really troublesome takeaway were the 2nd quarter turnovers. That's besides the obvious ongoing problem. Lack of bigs.

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Originally Posted by luckyman

They got some stuff to work on.

Only really troublesome takeaway were the 2nd quarter turnovers. That's besides the obvious ongoing problem. Lack of bigs.

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The defense was awful. Three of our five starters matching up with their man on the perimeter were flat-footed, and then chased them all the way to the goal in a lay up drill.. When the other players tried to rotate to cover for the bad defense, the Magic had wide open looks from deep. Luckily, the Magic didn't shoot well from deep.

Anyone who thinks this team can afford to get rid of JV is crazy.

I know its only the first game of pre-season, but its also your opponents first game of preseason, too.

i know we held our other big out tonight but i dont think im going to like zion being the backup center.....the west is too stacked with bigs and smart teams are not going to play down to zion...they're going to stay big and force us to go 6'10 up...

I did notice the defense but that has to be because they don’t want to get hurt, right? That’s what I’m going with. Lol

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Originally Posted by Fedupfan

I did notice the defense but that has to be because they don’t want to get hurt, right? That’s what I’m going with. Lol

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then you have 3 games in 5 days...

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Originally Posted by Fedupfan

I did notice the defense but that has to be because they don’t want to get hurt, right? That’s what I’m going with. Lol

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The defense was good when the offense was good - scoring created the opportunity for the defense to get back and set. The problem is when we missed and they were able to get out, especially in transition, while we had guys back in the paint attempting to rebound. That's an issue but it's also not a worldbreaking problem - we were a top 6 defense last year (top 5 before the end of season collapse) so I have precedent to expect that even if it won't be the prettiest, it will be serviceable.

It's going to look rough in preseason because half the people playing are not real NBA players, the ones that are don't play real minutes, they're getting used to a new style and playing into shape for some.

The only person on the team who looked like they could play 35 minutes of real NBA ball right now was Herb. Everyone else clearly has some rust to shake off, even BI and JV who both played international ball this summer.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Pelicanidae

The defense was good when the offense was good - scoring created the opportunity for the defense to get back and set. The problem is when we missed and they were able to get out, especially in transition, while we had guys back in the paint attempting to rebound. That's an issue but it's also not a worldbreaking problem - we were a top 6 defense last year (top 5 before the end of season collapse) so I have precedent to expect that even if it won't be the prettiest, it will be serviceable.

It's going to look rough in preseason because half the people playing are not real NBA players, the ones that are don't play real minutes, they're getting used to a new style and playing into shape for some.

The only person on the team who looked like they could play 35 minutes of real NBA ball right now was Herb. Everyone else clearly has some rust to shake off, even BI and JV who both played international ball this summer.

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Transition defense wasn't the glaring issue. The halfcourt defense was; it was 'Swiss Cheese'. #1, #3, and #17 were caught flatfooted all night in the halfcourt (and it's not like we haven't seen this from all of them in the past). # 14 was barely adequate and Herb is. well...Herb. This kind of defense will NEVER win in the postseason.....NEVER!!! (No matter how good the offense supposedly is)

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Originally Posted by As I See It

Transition defense wasn't the glaring issue. The halfcourt defense was; it was 'Swiss Cheese'. #1, #3, and #17 were caught flatfooted all night in the halfcourt (and it's not like we haven't seen this from all of them in the past). # 14 was barely adequate and Herb is. well...Herb. This kind of defense will NEVER win in the postseason.....NEVER!!! (No matter how good the offense supposedly is)

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This is what I noticed. Seemed to be a complete lack of effort.