There was no recapturing the magic of last season’s postseason run that saw the New Orleans Pelicans vault from play-in tournament to the actual playoffs where they pushed the Phoenix Suns to the limit.
There was no inspirational “You gotta fight” speech from second-year coach Willie Green to save the Pelicans this time.
The Boosie song “Wipe Me Down” — a staple after every Pelicans’ victory in the Smoothie King Center this season — was nowhere to be heard.
All that was remaining in the rubbish after Wednesday night’s 123-118 loss to the Oklahoma City Thunder were a bunch of disappointments and "what ifs?"
A season that began with so much promise came to a screeching halt far sooner than anyone expected, especially after seeing what the Pelicans had done this time a year ago. Or heck, what they had done just 3½ months ago when they were on the top rung of the Western Conference ladder.
Now, they find themselves on the outside of the playoffs looking in, a long way from where they were in December when Zion Williams threw down that 360 dunk against the Phoenix Suns as time expired. On Wednesday night, he threw down a windmill dunk that garnered just as much attention, this one coming during pregame warmups in a game the Pelicans surely could have used him. While it was quite clear from the courtside view that Williamson didn’t have the explosiveness we are accustomed to seeing, you couldn’t help but wonder just how different this season could have been if he didn’t get hurt or returned to health in a timely manner.
The Pelicans briefly showed they could be a serious playoff contender when healthy. Turns out, they were just teasing. The “when healthy” part inevitably did them in.
Williamson played only 29 games. Brandon Ingram, who helped revive the team down the stretch, played in only 45 games. And the most glaring number of all? The trio of Williamson, Ingram and CJ McCollum played in just 10 games together all season.
That’s why the Pelicans, for a second straight year, were in the play-in tournament instead of the actual playoffs. With that trio, the Pelicans are easily one of the top six teams in the Western Conference. Without all three of them, they struggled for most of the second half of the season until they rattled off wins in nine of their last 12 regular-season games. If there was no such thing as a play-in tournament, this would have been the fifth straight season the franchise didn’t make the postseason after finishing ninth both last year and this year.
Yes, there were some good signs. There was Ingram playing at an All-NBA level down the stretch. There was McCollum playing through thumb and shoulder injuries because he knows the team was better with him than without him. There was Jonas Valanciunas, who averaged a double-double this season. And there were the giant strides made by second-year players Trey Murphy and Herb Jones.
None of that was enough. By the time Wednesday’s win-or-go-home game came along, a team that once had so much depth no longer did.
Williamson was dressed in street clothes watching from the bench, just like he’s been since injuring his hamstring on Jan. 2. So was Jose Alvarado, who missed the last 20 games. So was Larry Nance Jr.
“It’s important to have your guys on the floor," Green said. "I don’t know if that’s the central issue. But it’s definitely important. It helps your team reach its potential. We didn’t do that this season.’’
Yeah, the record improved from 36-46 a year ago to 42-40 this season, the franchise’s first winning mark since the 2017-18 season. But this season was supposed to be so much more than that. A team that pushed Phoenix to six games in the first round last season set the bar high and was expected to surpass that this season, especially with Williamson returning after missing all 82 games last year. He missed 54 this season if you include Wednesday’s play-in game. And that’s what makes the results of this season such a hard pill to swallow for everyone involved.
“It’s difficult for sure,” Green said. “It’s difficult when you come in with expectations, and we all know how good we can be. We just didn’t get a chance to see that group on the floor enough to be the team we know we can be. It happens.”
Green said the highlight of the season was in December when the Pelicans reached their peak as the No. 1 team in the Western Conference.
“It gave our fans, it gave our team perspective on what we could be,” Green said.
Then came the lowlights. Zion’s injury. Jose’s injury. The road loss to the Houston Rockets. And then the loss to the Minnesota Timberwolves in the regular-season finale, a setback that dropped the Pelicans from eighth to ninth in the standings. It was a loss that meant the Pelicans needed to win two games in the play-in tournament instead of one. Turns out, they couldn’t win the first one.
Just like that, the season is over.
“We had a goal at the beginning of the season,” Ingram said. “It was picture perfect just having Zion and CJ and myself and having one of the best defensive players in the league in Herb and Trey Murphy, the best shooter in the league. It looked really good on paper.”
Unfortunately for the Pelicans, the game isn’t played on paper. It's played on the court.
And this season, they just didn’t have enough of their star players on the court at the same time.
