Passion. Purpose. Pride.

The Hornets didn't have any of it this evening, instead conceding to bend over in front of the Washington Wizards for the second time in a week. The result was a 101-84 blowout victory for the Wiz. Linkage: box | recap | standings

Chris Paul vs. Antawn Jamison

Notes, thoughts, hopes and dreams...

  • Call me a prick if you like, but I'm not giving the Wizards a lot of credit for this one. I don't like their team much. They have a lot of guys who only seem interested in seeing how little they can pass and how early in the shot clock they can chuck one up. They do seem to play hard, and their defense doesn't suck, but I just can't consider them a good team.

  • So no, I don't think the Wizards beat us in this one. It was more a matter of the Hornets playing like crap than the Wizards playing great. For one thing, we came out in the first and third quarters with about as much energy as a fat rock. It was as if all our guys had been flashed by one of those Men In Black memory eraser things. Hey fellas, don't you remember the game last Monday? It was the one that sucked. Yeah, this is the same team. We need to decapitate them.

    On top of the amnesia, we decided to handle the ball like it was a monkey on fire. 15 turnovers, many of them unforced, leading to 22 points for Washington. Not fantastic.

    And then there was the total lack of teamwork. It seemed as if we were either feeding David West in the post, or else we were going one-on-one. That had to be the game plan, because we didn't deviate much from it. Lots of one-on-one means four other guys standing there watching the ball. No weak side cuts, no off the ball screens. Ugly, stagnant basketball.
  • I can't say anyone played well for the Hornets tonight. Maybe Mike James, but then he was perhaps the prime example of our shitty ball movement. He got to the hole and got us some buckets, but he wasn't going to win the game all by himself.

  • You know who can win games all by himself? Chris Paul! Well, at least he has the ability to takeover games and lead us to the win. Just like last Monday however, CP seemed incapable of that tonight. There was a stretch in the third quarter where he got that look in his eye and dominated for a few minutes, but at crunch time he just didn't have it going. I guess he is human after all.

  • The Hornets are 0-3 with Bonzi Wells in the lineup. Not that you should read much into that. Bonzi was actually an asset during his eight minutes of PT tonight. He was hustling, made some plays, grabbed six boards. Unfortunately, he re-aggravated that Achilles injury, so he'll probably be disobeying the dress code again for the next few games.

  • Antawn Jamison came up big for the Wiz, after having a sub-par outing in New Orleans last Monday. He had 28 points and 9 boards, repeatedly abusing Peja Stojakovic's defensive efforts.

  • Three technical fouls called in this one. It was a pretty physical game. David West and Brendan Haywood had words after our guy gave a hard foul late in the second quarter. Haywood talked the tough stuff as he backed away. West gave it right back as he stood his ground. Both guys got T'd up.

    There was plenty of bitching at the refs, mostly from our guys. I hate when we resort to that when we're playing like crap out there. Worry about fixing our own shit, not what the refs are calling.

  • I'm not sure how the rebounding battle came out even (44 each). There seemed to be so many trips where the Wizards would come up with a couple of offensive rebounds. Tyson Chandler started out with 5 boards in about 5 minutes, but only finished with 8 in the game.

Screw it, I'm done with this. I feel stupider for having watched that game. My brain is fried. Let's hope we can bounce back and not suck against the Knicks tomorrow.