R.I.P. to the New Orleans Pelicans’ season.
And that stands for way more than just Rest In Peace.
It’s also for Really Inept Postseason, which sums up what Willie Green’s Pelicans put on display in the four games it took for them to get swept by the Oklahoma City Thunder.
And R.I.P is also for the Rough Ingram Performance, perhaps the best way to describe Brandon Ingram’s play in this first-round NBA playoff series.
This Pelicans’ season took its final breath around 10 p.m. Monday in a 97-89 loss in the Smoothie King Center.
But truth be told, this season really ended 13 days ago when Zion Williamson exited this same court in a loss to the Los Angeles Lakers with a hamstring injury. Any chance of this postseason spilling over into May disappeared with Zion as he headed to the locker room that night. The Thunder, the No. 1 seed in the West, were too much for the Pels.
Zion slammed down a white towel in frustration as he left the court on April 16.
On Monday night, the Pelicans threw the towel in on the season, a tough ending to a year that looked bright just a month ago.
It seems fitting that Pelicans’ fans were given black T-shirts to wear Monday night. And it seemed equally appropriate that the team was playing on the black and fluorescent green “Skelican” city edition basketball court. This court has pretty much been a cemetery for the Pelicans, who lost 11 of their last 13 there. Including the play-in tournament and two playoff games, the Pels finished 22-22 on their home floor, a bizarre record for a team that had the best road record in the NBA this season.
Any chance of hitting the road again and sending this series back to Oklahoma for Game 5 ended when OKC’s Jalen Williams drained a deep 3-pointer to put the Thunder ahead 93-82 with 3:08 left. The Pelicans hadn’t scored more than 92 points the entire series and that trend wasn’t about to end Monday.
Instead of extending the series, the Pels got swept for the second time in franchise history. The other time was in the 2014-15 season when the Golden State Warriors needed just four games. That series included a game where the Pelicans blew a 20-point lead in Game 3.
The Pelicans were never able to grab that type of lead against the Chet Holmgren-anchored Thunder defense that suffocated the Pels all series long. The Pelicans averaged just 89.5 points in the series.
“For four games, we struggled offensively,” Green said. “Our defense kind of held us together, but we just couldn’t make the shots that we needed to make.”
Nobody had a tougher time than Ingram, who was supposed to carry the load in Williamson’s absence. He didn’t. The Pelicans’ second-leading scorer averaged just 14.3 points in the series, saving his worst performance for the finale. He was a dismal 2 of 14 from the floor and finished with eight points.
Ingram was supposed to be one of the top two or three scorers in this series. He ended up sixth, getting outscored by OKC’s trio of Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, Holmgren and Jalen Williams as well as teammates CJ McCollum and Jonas Valanciunas.
Instead of shouldering the scoring load, he has to shoulder much of the blame for the Pelicans’ earlier than expected exit.
“Nobody is more motivated or more mad than I am about where I am right now and what happened throughout this playoff, what happened before the playoffs and what happened throughout the season,” Ingram said.
Ingram struggled after returning in the regular-season finale from a knee injury that caused him to miss 12 games. He was clearly not himself once he returned, but he didn’t put the blame for his poor showing on that.
“I played,” Ingram said. “I don’t think this is a great time to make excuses. I played and just came up short. I wasn’t able to catch a rhythm.”
Truth be told, nobody was.
The Pelicans had just three 20-point scorers the entire series. McCollum scored 20 Monday night and also had 20 in Game 1. Trey Murphy scored 21 points in Game 1.
“In a series like this against a team like that with Zion out, I had to be great for us to win,” McCollum said. “And I wasn’t great.”
Against a team like the Thunder, the Pelicans needed somebody — anybody — to be great. The one player who could’ve been was sitting on the bench, hoping his teammates could stretch this series out long enough for his hamstring to heal. The Pels know better than anyone that injuries are a part of the game and they aren’t dwelling on what-ifs.
“There’s no excuses,” McCollum said. “It’s unfortunate. You look at what it could’ve been like if we had Z. You look at what the Thunder would be like without Shai. That’s not the reality. That wasn’t what we went through. For us it’s about about figuring out how to be better. We had enough to compete at a high level and we didn’t consistently and that was the difference in the game. We were a good team in spurts and at times creeping toward great. But we weren’t healthy enough to really get to see it.”
Now, the Pelicans’ season is over, leaving far more questions than answers. The biggest question will be this one: What will the Pels do with Ingram?
He has one year remaining on his contract.
Will the Pelicans sign him to an extension? Or will the Pelicans move on from one of the cornerstones of the team?
We’ll find out in an offseason that begins way earlier than expected for a team that won 49 games.
That’s tied for the second-most wins in franchise history, a number that doesn’t mean as much when you get swept in the first round.
“It’s tough,” Ingram said. “We always knew it was a possibility we could go home tonight. But sitting in that locker room and it’s like ‘Damn, this is our last day.’ ”