There aren’t many Dallas Mavericks supporters in the Crescent City, but there will be on Tuesday. New Orleans put itself in position Friday to advance to the quarterfinal round of the NBA’s inaugural In-Season Tournament, but the Pelicans will need some help from their newfound “friends” in Big D. After New Orleans beat the Clippers in Los Angeles, they moved to the top of the Group B standings. To stay there, Houston (2-1 in the group) must lose Tuesday in Dallas.
Friday’s back-and-forth contest in Crypto.com Arena featured an early 21-point New Orleans lead, an LA mid-game surge, followed by the visitors delivering down the stretch of the final quarter. Zion Williamson made several crucial plays, including ripping the ball away from James Harden for a steal and layup with 34 seconds to go, giving the Pelicans a six-point edge. New Orleans built a quick lead partly behind a superb start from Brandon Ingram, who through 10 minutes of action had outscored the Clippers by himself, 16-12.
WEST GROUP B STANDINGS
NEW ORLEANS 3-1, +33
Houston 2-1, +16
z-Denver 2-2, -10
z-Dallas 1-2, -14
z-LA Clippers 1-3, -25
z-eliminated from contention
REMAINING SCHEDULE
Tuesday: Houston at Dallas, 7:30 p.m.
THREE POINTS
Z, BI rolling.
The Duke combo of New Orleans starting forwards connected on a couple more alley oops, with Ingram tossing ahead and around the rim so Williamson could leap and convert a basket. That was a portion of Williamson’s 32-point night on 13/25 shooting, while Ingram also reached the 30-point mark and made over half of his shots (30 points, 12/21 from the field). Herb Jones joined those two with clutch-time prowess, totaling 14 points and going 3/4 from three-point range, not to mention his defense (one steal, one block, assigned to a combination of LA’s veteran offensive weapons).
Uncanny success vs. Clippers continues.
No matter the location, no matter the stakes, no matter how the game starts, New Orleans has had LA’s number in recent years. The Pelicans are now 10-2 against the Clippers since the beginning of the 2020-21 campaign, highlighted by a 2022 play-in tournament victory, also in the City of Angels. The stakes weren’t quite as high as that Friday, but once again, the Pelicans prevailed in a situation where they needed to beat LA.
A tournament wrinkle.
Normally a team with an eight-point lead in the final seconds would simply dribble out the clock, but the Pelicans’ Larry Nance Jr. dunked to give his team a 10-point lead. On the ensuing Clippers inbound pass, Jones tried to steal the ball but couldn’t come up with it. That turned out to be NOLA’s final chance to remain in contention for a West wild-card berth, because Phoenix finished 3-1 and runner-up in Group A with a plus-34 point differential. The Pelicans ended up at plus-33. As a result, the only pathway remaining for NOLA to advance is by winning Group B.
BY THE NUMBERS
2 or 3: New Orleans “seed” in the West bracket of the In-Season Tournament if it advances by virtue of a Houston loss on Tuesday. The Lakers appear to be comfortably in the No. 1 spot and likely to host Phoenix (wild card), barring any epic routs in Tuesday tournament games. Right now Sacramento is in the No. 2 slot and would host NOLA or Houston in the Dec. 4-5 quarterfinals. In a best-case scenario it is still possible for the Pelicans to host a quarterfinal, but they’d need the Rockets (at Dallas) and Kings (vs. Golden State) to both lose Tuesday, as well as other minor considerations to occur.
5-0: Won-loss record of New Orleans' current starting lineup. The group has notched victories over Dallas, Denver, Sacramento (twice) and the Clippers.
3-3: Pelicans road record. All of those defeats occurred during the same Nov. 6-10 trip to Denver, Minnesota and Houston, all clubs that are over .500 record-wise. Prior to that, New Orleans won at Memphis and Oklahoma City.