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Not much was expected of the Charlotte Hornets in the 2023-24 campaign, and true to form, they have gotten off to a 2-4 start through their first six games of the season, with their latest outing resulting in a hard-fought 124-118 loss to the Dallas Mavericks. While it's tough to see the Hornets continuing to struggle amid their rebuild, Steve Clifford is quite excited with what he's seeing from LaMelo Ball early on.
Ball is the primary building block for the Hornets right now, but he had an extra slow start to the season, and his numbers over the first five games of the year were pretty ugly (14.6 PPG, 8.6 APG, 4.2 RPG, 29.7 FG%). Ball turned in easily his best outing of the season against Dallas, though, (30 PTS, 13 AST, 10 REB, 11-23 FGM) and Clifford's warning about Ball's play should scare the rest of the league.
"[LaMelo Ball] played great. We had a lot of guys play good. Gordon [Hayward], PJ [Washington], Mark [Williams], we had a bunch of guys that played well. Melo was terrific, he's getting into rhythm."
Steve Clifford on Melo's 30-point triple-double.
(via @JerryDonatien) pic.twitter.com/XJVy7aguu4
— ClutchPoints (@ClutchPoints) November 6, 2023
The Hornets may not have gotten the win, but slowing down Luka Doncic and company is always going to be a tough ask for a team like the Hornets. And while LaMelo Ball was the star of the outing, Steve Clifford is right to note that P.J. Washington and Gordon Hayward both had big nights, scoring 20 points themselves, while Mark Williams put together a 19-point, 10-rebound double-double while hitting every shot he took from the field.
It's clear that the Hornets still have a lot of work to do when it comes to their current rebuild, but if they can continue to string together some strong outings on both ends of the floor, they may have a shot to sneak into the Play-In Tournament in the Eastern Conference. Ball will be critical to everything Charlotte does this year, and Clifford seems to think that he's heating up after a rough start to the season, which is precisely what all Hornets fans want to hear.
