A moment of honesty: I was wondering why TNT chose to broadcast the Heat/Hawks game on Monday night instead of the Hornets/Nuggets which got relegated to NBA TV. I thought the Hornets/Nuggets would have been a more appealing series to a national audience, featuring recognizable stars like Chris Paul and Carmelo Anthony, while the only star in the other game is Dwyane Wade. Looks like I was wrong and the TNT execs knew what they were doing. Maybe they passed on the game because they knew the Hornets wouldn’t show up. New Orleans got blasted at home, tying a record for losing by 58 points in Game 4, 121-63. The entire game and everything about it was laughable. There’s no possible excuse for playing so poorly and letting someone else walk all over you. Especially in a playoff game!
“That’s the worst game I’ve seen us play in the five years I’ve been here,” said Coach Byron Scott, who saw the Hornets go 18-64 in his first season, 2004-05. “I thought they tried to take us out of everything we tried to do on the floor. I thought they were physically ready for the game.”
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“This was a systematic beating,” said West, who made four of 10 shots for 14 points. “They have a lot of weapons in their arsenal. They just systematically beat us. They overwhelmed us with their ability to score.”
Teams usually bounce back from butt-whoopings in the playoffs, but I’m guessing the Hornets are done. This is a devastating loss, the kind from which a team does not recover. How long did it take the Mavericks to bounce back from losing in the finals to the Heat, blowing the 2-0 lead and the huge Game 3 lead? I’m not sure they ever recovered. Remember this game by the Hornets — it will be a seminal moment for this team. Will it mar them for good or will they bounce back? I think they’re toast.
