The Pelicans Can’t Weather the Storm: Story of the Series
The New Orleans Pelicans have been eliminated from the 2024 NBA playoffs. Read on for a recap of the series
On the same night that the latest season of the ‘Lakeshow’ ended, another series would come to a close in the western conference as the Oklahoma City Thunder completed four game sweep of the New Orleans Pelicans. And to be frank, I don’t think there’s a soul that expected the result to be any different.
Let’s not kid ourselves: ever since Zion Williamson was drafted, New Orleans’ success has been defined by whether their star plays or not. When Zion is on the floor alongside floor spacers like Brandon Ingram and C.J McCollum (check spelling), the Pelicans are a formidable dark horse team. Take him off the floor however and the team’s chances of success decrease drastically. Conversely the Oklahoma City Thunder are a team that should be on everyone’s radar after a regular season where they had the best record in the Western Conference alongside the Denver Nuggets. Led by Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, who some have argued is an MVP candidate for this year, the Thunder did exactly what a team of their calibre should do to a play-in team like the New Orleans Pelican.
Mop the floor with them.
Game 1 was the only game where the Pelicans seemed to have a genuine chance of winning. In a game that was dead even going into the last two minutes, the Thunder would eke out a win in the end. Despite their best efforts, New Orleans could not gain the upperhand on Oklahoma, a result that would be repeated three more times. By the time game 4 around, I am not ashamed to admit I did not watch (and not just because I had other articles to write on several series that had reached their conclusions). No disrespect to the Pelicans, they fought until the bitter end. But if we’re being honest with ourselves, this outcome was never in doubt.
With the series over, Oklahoma moves on to the second round. The young hungry team has no intention of slowing down, and if they keep playing at this level I wouldn’t be surprised to see them in the conference finals. As for the Pelicans, they’re going back to the drawing board with plenty of questions to keep them scratching their heads. But arguably the most pressing one is: should they keep trying with Zion? The young star still has plenty of potential, and his showing against LeBron and the Lakers proved he is still every bit as formidable as one could hope for. But time and time again he has proven to be unreliable as far as his health is concerned. Durability and conditioning are a pair of considerable concerns for him going forward, and while I wouldn’t go as far as to say the Pelicans should get rid of him, they should absolutely ask themselves where they see things going for the remainder of his time in ‘The Big Easy.’
This series was akin to watching a long-running sitcom you’ve watched for years. Despite being surprised a few times during its course you more or less know where each episode is going on the way to the ‘season finale.’ That doesn’t mean it’s unenjoyable mind you. That doesn’t mean you’re wrong to root for the underdog. But like Carlton throwing up that hail mary shot in the basketball episode of The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, you can see the miss coming before the camera finishes its dramatic shot of Carlton’s hopeful face.
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