Time To Bee-lieve In The Charlotte Hornets

With the playoffs in sight, the time to get on the Charlotte Hornets’ bandwagon is now.

The Charlotte Hornets are rolling right now and it seems momentum is on their side. The Hornets currently sit in 6th place and are only a game behind 3rd place. If they keep playing the way they are playing they can get to 3rd place but that is as high as they can go. Let us take a look at how they are winning so many games and what is their ceiling as a team.

Offense Is Consistent Enough

The Hornets have never been known for their three point shooting but this season it has been a different story. The Hornets are third in three point shooting and are on pace to be the best three point shooting team in the history of the franchise. That change in philosophy to a team that can hit threes consistently has made this team deadly.

This also works well with Al Jefferson back in the line up because a big man anchoring the middle causes teams to pick their poison. Either a team can let the Hornets shoot three pointers on them all night or they can try to stop Jefferson in the paint.

The team has also has seen their young players mature some. Kemba Walker has turned into the leader on the team that he was on his UConn team in college basketball. Cody Zeller is turning into a solid player and has shown flashes of being a starter for the future. Frank Kaminsky is turning into a solid young player and has seen his minutes increase as the season has went along.

The Hornets have done a good job of developing new players as well in Jeremy Lamb and Jeremy Lin. Both players have shown they are very good players coming off the bench and can fill in and start if injuries occur. Nicolas Batum has been a key piece to this team’s offense and needs to be resigned. The offense is good enough to compete night in and night out.

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Walker is a threat to steal the ball every possession and forces teams to worry about getting the ball ripped away from their hands when driving to the basket. The one knock on this team is that they do not have a true shot blocker down low. Yes, Zeller does tend to block shots here and there but it is not consistent enough to consider it a threat when they play defense. So, teams that can drive the ball into the paint consistently tend to give the Hornets issues. This will need to be addressed in the off season as it cannot be done right now.

Outlook For The Rest Of This Season

You can fully expect the Hornets to finish the season in the playoffs but the road ahead for the rest of the season is by no means easy. Expect to see the Hornets finish anywhere from sixth place to fourth place with a fifth place finish as the more likely outcome.

Next: Race for the Fourth Seed

If the Hornets can win half of their remaining away games they will be in good shape. If they drop most of them or all of them they will drop even more in the standings. The Hornets should win around half of their remaining road games and all their home games. Go Hornets!

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