Big Picture

The Pelicans took a skeleton crew to Phoenix on Friday night to face off against the Suns. The squad put up a solid effort and made it a closer game than it had to be but ended up losing 124-111. Let’s dig into the data for a bit more of the story.

Scoring Summary

Take the first quarter out of the equation and the Suns outscored the Pels the entire game. The 2nd quarter was where the Suns did most of their scoring damage. Through the initial 5 game stretch, New Orleans’ total scoring has been trending downwards from a season high of 130 to 111 in the Phoenix loss.

Edge Summary

Pelicans’ Overall Advantage in Scoring

The Suns had the edge in field goal efficiency, 52%-44%. They took more field goal shots and also made ten more than New Orleans.

The Pelicans had a better outing in the area of three-pointers. They shot 41% compared with the Suns’ 30% three-pointer percentage. The Pels also had the edge when it made to total three-pointers attempted and made.

New Orleans narrowly edged out the Suns in free throw efficiency, 91%-90%. The two teams were about what and what in terms of how much time they spent at the line.

Rebounding and Blocks

The Suns had the edge in both rebounding and blocks, by wide margins. Phoenix accounted for 59% (47) of the game’s total rebounds. The Pelicans really fell short, comparatively, in the blocking category. They only accounted for 1 of the game’s 8 total blocks.

The Pelicans had been demonstrating a downward trend in rebounds, but picked it back up against the Suns.

Assists and Steals

Phoenix took the edge in assists by a decent sized margin. They accounted for 57% (33) of the game’s total assists. At the end, the Pelicans walked away with the upper hand in steals, tallying up 59% (10) of the game’s total steals.

Fouling

It was another tough fouling night for the Pelicans. They were the recipient of 54% (21) of the game’s total called fouls.

Turnovers

The Suns took better care of the ball and accounted for only 46% (12) of the game’s total turnovers. The teams were tied in terms of converting turnovers into points, though.  

Final Thoughts

It was the Pelicans biggest loss of the season so far but they went into the game severely undermanned. Some of the trend data is showing the gradual impacts that the injury issues the team’s been experiencing early on in the season. It’s a long season, though, and they’ve got a lot of time to get folks healthy and the unit trending in the right direction.

So far, New Orleans is 3-2 on the season and facing the Clippers in Los Angeles on Sunday afternoon.