- Charlotte Hornets vs. Toronto Raptors
- Monday, Dec. 14 at 7 PM EST
- Fox Sports Southeast and WFNZ 610 AM
- Last time out: Raptors won, 111-100, on Dec. 12 (preseason)
Hornets Control the Rebounding Battle
Charlotte experimented with a number of different rotations in Saturday night’s preseason opener, which included utilizing PJ Washington and Miles Bridges at the five and four, respectively. Going small can sometimes hurt the rebounding on the defensive end, but the Hornets actually won the battle on the boards, 54-46 with their rebounding percentage almost 14 points higher than their 2019-20 season-long average (84.2% compared to 70.6%).
Faster Pace Becoming a Priority
After finishing last in the NBA in pace last season at 96.24 possessions per 48 minutes, the Hornets have made playing faster a primary focus this campaign. So far, so good as they recorded a 114.50 mark on Saturday night (for reference, Milwaukee’s 105.51 led the league last year). A chunk of Charlotte’s number can be attributed to preseason play and a high turnover rate in the game (more on that below), but purely just watching the style of play, there’s already an obvious emphasis on pushing the tempo.
Turnovers Prove Costly in Preseason Opener
Had Charlotte’s 23 giveaways two nights ago taken place in a regular season contest, it would have been the team’s highest single-game total since Jan. 30, 2013. Borrego attributed the haphazard ball-handling (which led to 28 opposing points) to a multitude of factors including sloppiness, poor spacing, unfamiliarity, higher pace and Toronto’s physicality. Regardless the reason, look for ball security to be heavily stressed in this second exhibition go-around.
Game Preview Quote
“You want to play fast, but not in a hurry. You want to come off as if you’re playing fast and playing engaged, but you don’t ever want to let anyone speed you up. I think [Toronto] sped us up [on Saturday night], instead of us relaxing and spacing out the floor... That’s the type of team we are trying to get to be, playing in the gaps and speeding teams up.” – Terry Rozier
Final Thoughts
Saturday’s outing certainly showed promising glimpses of how the Hornets want to play this season – faster, smaller at times and more aggressively in transition. Turnovers are a natural growing pain at this stage (especially coming off quite the accelerated offseason) and should diminish a bit as the team continues building chemistry over the next few weeks.
Additional Notes: Raptors G Kyle Lowry (personal) is out again tonight… LaMelo Ball had a game-high 10 rebounds off the bench in Saturday night’s loss. Only three Charlotte rookie guards have ever recorded double-digit rebounds as a reserve in a regular season game: Tony Delk (April 1997), PJ Hairston (Dec. 2014) and Cody Martin (Nov. 2019).