The Charlotte Hornets had another dreadful offensive performance as they were thoroughly outclassed by the Bucks in the 123-85 loss.

Summary

The Hornets hung tough with the Bucks for a few minutes. That ended when Damian Lillard sent Cody Martin to the floor on a step back (he stepped on Martin’s foot) and cashed in a three. That set the Bucks off on a 15-0 run that was only ended by Seth Curry swatting a 3-pointer that led to a fast break dunk for Miles Bridges. The first quarter ended with the Hornets trailing 32-16.

It only got worse in the second quarter. The Hornets scored eight points in the first 1:34 of the second quarter then didn’t score again until the two minute mark. That made up the entirety of their scoring. The Bucks scored 18 straight points during that cold spell with a hefty chunk of those points coming from Bobby Portis. The 26 points the Hornets scored in the first half is the fewest any NBA team has scored in a half this season. The Bucks matched or exceeded that first half point total in every quarter of the game.

The third quarter was more of the same. The Hornets couldn’t find any space to operate offensively and were forced into turnovers and contested shots. Defensively they couldn’t handle the Bucks on the inside. They gave up several offensive rebounds relative to the rare Bucks misses. The Bucks had a chance to take a 50 point lead at one point, but the Hornets held firm thanks to an offensive foul call. The deficit was 47 heading into the fourth quarter.

Then the comeback was on…
Obviously that’s not true. Brandon Miller hit a couple of jumpers to become the first Hornets player in the game to scratch double figures in scoring. Tre Mann and Miles Bridges each got layups a few possessions later to join him. Davis Bertans hit a few threes. When all was said and done, the Hornets won the fourth quarter and only lost by

The Good

Uhhh…¯\(°_o)/¯

The Bad

Everything relating to basketball. The Hornets never threatened to break the Bucks defense down and were grasping for any sort of attempt at the basket. The offense was very, very slow. That’s never going to work against the length and discipline of a team like the Bucks. It appears as though the Hornets are coming back down to Earth after their hot post-trade deadline spurt. While the defense was been good, the offense has been deteriorating back to pre-trade deadline levels of futility.

That previously temporarily elite defense didn’t show up tonight either. The Hornets seemed to lose their edge pretty quickly after the game got out of hand. The Bucks were able to get whatever they wanted and bullied the Hornets inside. Hopefully this is just a blip for what has been a much improved defensive unit.

The Hornets have lost three games to the Bucks this season by an average of 35 points per game. They have yet to crack 100 points or hold the Bucks to under 120.

We have to do this again in two days.

What’s Next

This again. The teams will both fly to Charlotte so they can play each other again in a different venue on Thursday.