Udrih ( B- ) -- after a couple of fairly shaky efforts, this was back to Beno 101, and with Reke in foul trouble it was important for him to be steady, if not spectacular. Made a great laser pass to Cousins inside early, you know the one where you blow it right by the defenders ear. And in the early 2nd really played well on both ends, not only waking up offensively inside and out, but hustling to stay in front of his man on defense. Got in front of CP3 on the break and took the charge right in the chest. Unfortunately when the Hornets went to their bench they came up wiht Marcus Thornton, and that was just an athletic nightmare for Beno as the guy just went right over and around him and burned him repeatedly. But wtih Reke out, we went to Luther Head to try to contain CP3, and that left Beno having to guard the hyper athletic SG. Which is not good. After Reke returend got back to back assists to Reke and Daly at a key point in the mid 4th with the Hornets threatening. Intentionally fouled and hit the clutch FTs at the 31 second mark to make it 6. Made one final terrible decision that reminded you of the sorts fo things we were always dong as we found ways to lsoe all those tight gasmes late, as he mysteriously threw a fullcourt pass to Dalembert on the semibreak with us up 6 and 8 seconds to go. Daly couldn't handle it of course and it was a turnover, and basically represented the only possible way you could give the Hornets any chance for a miracle. Just dumb. But in the end did not matter or hurt us, so just a footnote rather than a real factor in this grade.
Evans ( B ) -- played a strong game...during those minutes when he was actually out there. And turned what could have been the story of the game from his foul trouble, to our victory as he returned in the 4th and gave us a huge lift down the stretch. Teamed with Cousins for our early explosion, mixing multiple great drives with a backdoor slip off the ball (getting better at that, and critically Cousins and he are the duo making that work using DeMarcus's passing ability), and then a three as we pummelled the Hornets with our two young studs early. But things looked grim when a night after having to try to guard Kobe, Reke now drew CP3, and picked up his second foul at the end of the first quarter. It was 3 before halftime, and then it looked like disaster had struck in the early 3rd as he picked up numbers 4 and 5 in the space of three minutes, and we were going to be without half our star package for a full quarter. We survived however, with help from some unlikley quarters (see rest of grades below) and with us in trouble in the early 4th we brought Reke back with 5 fouls to see if he could stabilize us and avoid that 6th. And he did both and then some. Was brave enough to reach in for a clean steal, then drew a foul, hit both FTs, and pulled up for a jumper. And it seemed like the spell was broken for us -- we stabilized, fought the rest of the way, had our swagger back. Made several tough finishes through contact in the midpoint of the quarter to hold the Hornets at bay, then set up Casspi for an open court little flip. Slipped back door and took the pass from Cousins at the 3:00 mark. Did miss a wide open Beno at the 2:00 mark on a possession where we came up empty, but its not clear whether he actually saw him or not. Had 9pts in the first with Cousins, 9pts in the 4th taking the leadership mantle from Cousins and bringing us home. And a whole lot of time on the bench chatting with Jermaine and Darnell in between. Most tantalizing were the moments when he and Cousins worked together and were both going well -- that's going to be a flat out nasty duo for a long time to come.
Bench
Landry ( D )-- interesting game, not for anything that really went on on the court, as for just how short a span he actually was out there. Jason gets hurt, the Hornets PF is basically just a blown up version of Carl (David West) and yet he only plays 23 minutes with minimal production as our twin towers lineup becomes more prevalent. Of course a lot of that was on him for not having one of his better games. He's been good a lot recently, but he never really seemed ot get anythign going in this one. Came up with one spectacular +1 play in the early going, falling backward and slamming it off the glass, but wasn't getting anything done defensively against West or on the glass, and never showed up anywhere offensively thereafter. By the late game we were clearly getting much better productivity out of Daly/Cousins, and so that became our down the stretch combo as we won the boards/interio battles again. Was tempted to give him a "+" here just on more of the "yeah, but he didn't really hurt us" theory. But franklly he didn't give me any hook to hang that extra grade on. So just a drab D.
Greene ( C+ ) -- played about 12 minutes in this one, but all of his productivity came on back to back spectacular plays in the early 2nd quarter, the first of which is the video above -- a spectacular slashing follow dunk of a Jeter miss where the ball had literally bounced outside of the plane of the backboard (check out the secod camera angle above) and he reached out with a long long arm snagged it and brought it all the way back for the huge slam. And then followed that with a quick three that probably wasn't a good shot, and more out of excitement than anything else, but it dropped too as we began to open the lead.
