Mark Williams registered his first career 30 point game to lead the Charlotte Hornets to a comeback win over the Utah Jazz, 117-112.

The summary

Brandon Miller opened the scoring with a three, and that was quickly followed by a trio of buckets from Mark Williams to launch the Hornets into a good start over a Jazz team that clearly wasn’t too worried about winning. They chucked up a handful of bad airballs in the first few minutes of the game as the visitors took a quick double figure lead. The script flipped when the Hornets went to their bench. A series of turnovers and missed shots let the Jazz make a quick comeback and take a lead that they would hold for the majority of the game. It was a 19-2 Utah run that only took about three minutes. After one, the Hornets trailed by seven.

Patty Mills checked in guns a-blazing in the second quarter and hit a few jumpers, but the Hornets quickly canceled out each with jumpers from Miles Bridges and Cody Martin. LaMelo Ball had a couple of acrobatic finishes around the basket, but it was an otherwise uneventful back and forth second quarter. The Hornets still trailed by seven at the half.

The Hornets had success attacking the paint to start the second half, but the Jazz seemed to match all of the layups with threes on the other end. The lead grew as large as 13 before the Hornets were able to chip away at it. Brandon Miller hit a couple of threes and a runner in the lane to help with that. Heading into the fourth, the Hornets still trailed by seven.

In the fourth, Mark Williams came back to life after a quiet middle two quarters. He had a free throw and three buckets from around the basket as the main part of a Hornets rally that evened the game up just a few minutes into the fourth. The Hornets took the lead on a LaMelo Ball layup, and he and Miles Bridges helped the Hornets pull ahead. Williams iced the game with free throws, and the main story became about whether or not he’d get his 30 point game. He held the ball for several seconds in the game’s closing moments to get the free throws, but he missed them both. Bridges hunted down the offensive rebound and tossed it to LaMelo, who rifled a baseball pass to Williams under the basket, where he dunked points 30 and 31.

The Good

That’s now back to back season highs in scoring for Mark Williams. He’s had prolonged spells in each of those games where he’s been a completely dominating force on both sides of the ball. The one block in the box score doesn’t illustrate how much of a deterrent he was at the rim. On offense, he’s been virtually automatic when he gets his hands on the ball anywhere near the rim.

LaMelo Ball was much more under control outside of a few turnovers early in the game. His shot selection was better, and that helped him to an efficient 27 points.

The Bad

The bench except for Cody Martin. In 70 combined minutes, the bench scored 11 points, and nine of those came from Martin. Tidjane Salaün, Taj Gibson, and Nick Smith Jr. went 0-of-7 from the field and didn’t score a point. All three had plus-minuses in the negative double digits in a game the Hornets won by five. They were all on the floor when the Jazz went on their huge run in the first quarter.

Josh Green has gone missing on offense. He’s now attempted four or fewer shots in all of the last four games. I know there aren’t a lot of shots to go around with the rest of the starters healthy, but there’s still a little bit of room for Green to be more aggressive.

The Hornets almost quite literally gave the game to the Jazz. They had 18 turnovers to the Jazz’s 10, and the eight extra shot attempts Utah took were almost enough to beat the Hornets because the teams shot with pretty similar efficiency. A lot of those turnovers were in the first half, and they were sloppy unforced errors. Traveling on the catch, stepping out of bounds, and the like.

What’s NExt

The Hornets wrap up their road trip against the Bulls in Chicago on Friday.