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Andrew LopezESPN
On Saturday, after a disappointing loss to the San Antonio Spurs, New Orleans Pelicans striker Zion Williamson told reporters he felt his team was close to what he wanted it to be. The Pelicans had just played two tough games on the road, losing to the Milwaukee Bucks and Spurs, but he thought things could return soon.
“I feel like we’re almost there,” Williamson said. “I really feel like we’re almost there. There are the last few things we have to figure out, but we’re almost there.”
Take a step in the right direction on Monday night.
Behind Williamson’s accusation in the third quarter, the Pelicans overturned the team with the best record in the league, holding on late to defeat the Utah Jazz 129-124.
The Pelicans had a 17-point lead early in the fourth quarter, but watched as Jazz reduced it to 1 in the final minute before resisting Utah’s last three possessions with a pair of stops. . Pelicans coach Stan Van Gundy joked that his team did not stay in control as long as they could build it high enough that Utah could not return.
Jazz (27-8) came into the game with a plus-161 point differential in the third quarter of this season, which was 70 points better than any other team. But the Pelicans (15-19) outscored them by 16 in the three-month quarter, the worst differential in the third quarter of the season for Utah.
“Tonight, we wanted to come out strong in the third,” said Lonzo Ball, the Pelicans guard. “That was one of the focal points of the coaching team. In this game, Utah blew people in that third quarter, so that was one of the points of interest. Z led the charge in the third for us.”
Williamson scored 15 of his 26 points in the third quarter as the Pelicans built on their advantage.
“My mind was all I could do to get the energy of my teammates, that’s what I’m going to do,” Williamson said. “In the third quarter, after reading the defense for the first two quarters, I really felt and went on the attack.”
Attacking the basket was the focus of the pelicans throughout the night. They finished with 74 points in the paint, the most that any team has scored in the paint in the regulation against Jazz in the last 25 seasons, according to ESPN Stats & Information research.
“It’s crazy that I’ve gotten so far in the basket with a defensive player like Rudy Gobert, where he’s all night, every night,” Pelican striker Brandon Ingram said of the Utah All-Star Center. “But I made it happen.”
To score so much in the paint meant that the pelicans did not have to rely on 3-point attempts. New Orleans went 7-for-11 from the 3-point range, and the 11 attempts were the fewest in a game of any winning team in the last four seasons, according to ESPN Stats & Information research. Along with Utah’s 43 deep attempts, the game had the biggest differential between two teams for 3-point attempts this season.
When Williamson scored in the third quarter, the Pelicans stayed with him and even went straight to Gobert, a two-time defensive player of the year, on several occasions.
“It means he’s fearless,” Ingram said of 20-year-old Williamson. “Knowing [Gobert is] a defensive player of the year twice or just a really, very, very good defensive player, he’s just fearless. He knows the angles of the shot. He knows what to do when he enters the game. He’s not going to hesitate. It will continue and continue until it reaches where it wants to go. “
So far this season, the Pelicans have won against the Utah, Milwaukee and Phoenix Suns, as well as a 24-point comeback against the Boston Celtics, but have also lost to the Detroit Pistons and Minnesota Timberwolves, teams at the bottom of the conference standings. their respective.
For a team, Williamson believes he is “almost there,” Van Gundy said the Pelicans are talented enough to beat anyone in the league, but they make too many mistakes and were not consistent enough in defense to put up with it. head winning the way they want.
Williamson agreed.
“For us to take it to the next level, we have to continue it for the next games,” Williamson said. “We have to be in line with that.”