The Charlotte Hornets split their Florida road trip games after losing to the Miami Heat on Friday night. Charlotte got off to a sluggish start against the South Beach franchise, finding themselves down by 18 points going into halftime.

For his part, Hornets head coach James Borrego said that they need to just get off to better starts.

“We were right there. Nobody was hanging their heads at halftime,” he continued.

The Hornets  have found themselves in some first-half holes in their first few games of the season, but it's definitely not a trend they'd like to continue. However, they have found ways to win those games despite being down by more than 15 points. Moving forward, they need to find a way to hit easier shots early on so they aren't fighting from behind practically the entire game.

Charlotte did find themselves within three points late in the contest. Miami just seemed to pull away in an instant and it was all because of their dominance on the glass. Charlotte was outrebounded 66-43 and Miami capitalized on second-chance points. They took advantage of the Hornets' small-ball lineup and an offense that just wasn't sharp to start the game

The Hornets did a good job of hitting the reset button in the second half. Miles Bridges and Gordon Hayward led the charge to make it a single digit game at one point. Hayward finished with 23 points and Bridges had 22 of his own. Those two provided the spark that made it look like the Charlotte might be able to squeak out of Florida with a win over the Orlando Magic and the Heat.

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Despite the loss, Charlotte did happen to split their road games on the mini road trip. “If we can go .500 on the road, I think we're a pretty good team,” Borrego said.

The better the road record, the more success a team is likely to have throughout the season, so coach is correct.

On a brighter note, the Hornets are closer to getting back to 100 percent as a team. PJ Washington returned to the rotation and played well after recovering from that knee injury. When asked about how he felt, he said he felt good and didn't feel any pain. All that is left now is to get Terry Rozier back out on the court, as he has only played one game so far this season.

The Hornets play the Portland Trail Blazers back at the Spectrum Center on Halloween and then the Cleveland Cavaliers that following Monday. Hopefully, they can take advantage of those couple of home games before heading out west for a five-game road trip.