Game 4 of the first-round series between the Golden State Warriors and the New Orleans Pelicans played out as expected Saturday night. The Pelicans' Anthony Davis was spectacular -- he scored 36 points, grabbed 11 rebounds and swatted three shots -- but the Warriors won again, 109-98, to complete the sweep to advance to the second round of the playoffs.
Why the Pelicans can be even better next year
What the 2014-15 season meant for the New Orleans Pelicans and what the future holds.
Derick E. Hingle-USA TODAY Sports
Davis averaged 31.5 points, 11 rebounds and three blocks per game in his first playoff series ever, but his Pelicans team couldn’t pick up a win against the Warriors.
“In this series, the focus was on winning, and in this series, winning one game,” Davis told reporters after the game. “And I wasn’t able to it. ... We got swept, and that’s a tough pill to swallow.”
In the 2015-16 season Davis is going to be on a mission to not only return to the playoffs, but also win a game and series. With a once-in-a-generation talent like Davis, the Pelicans are going to be dangerous for years to come.
Building around a superstar
On July 1, the Pelicans will likely offer Davis a five-year contract extension. He will be a free agent in the summer of 2017 if he doesn't sign. Davis will come back along with the core of Eric Gordon, Tyreke Evans, Jrue Holiday, Ryan Anderson and Quincy Pondexter. But Omer Asik will be an unrestricted free agent this summer.
Asik was a serviceable frontcourt mate for Davis, but he wasn’t a dominating presence. With Asik and Davis down low, the Pelicans had to be disappointed that their defensive rating of 104.7 ranked ninth-worst in the league. The team defense of the Pelicans needs to be fixed, and losing Asik will force the management to find someone else to pair with Davis.
The Pelicans don’t have a first-round pick in this year’s draft -- they traded it to acquire Asik -- so they’ll need to make moves in free agency. And if they do re-sign Asik, next year’s team will look very similar to this year’s with the hope that they’ll avoid the injury bug that plagued them this season. (Gordon, Evans, Holiday and Anderson fought injuries all year, and so did Davis.) If those players stayed healthy, this team could have won more than 45 games this season.
The returning core is full of young, talented players. And now they have playoff experience.
A coach to hold the Pelicans together
Monty Williams is likely to stick around after this season. It's unlikely he'll be punished for taking the Pelicans to the playoffs in the crucible that is the Western Conference. They finished 45-37 after finishing 34-48 in 2014-15. His Pelicans have steadily improved each year since Anthony Davis joined the team.
There were question marks about whether Williams would stick around if this team failed to make the playoffs, but he accomplished that. And he has developed Davis -- even if that seems like an easy job -- he knows how important that is. As Tom Haberstroh of ESPN reported, “Williams is hitching his wagon to Davis at every opportunity. When Davis walked into the tunnel after Saturday’s defeat, Williams was right there with him, placing his hand on Davis’ shoulder.”
Williams knows how important the superstar is to his team, but he also knows that his time in New Orleans isn’t guaranteed. NBA teams want to win now, and with a player like Davis, Williams is going to need his team to do more than just make the playoffs.
Can they make the jump in the West?
Full disclosure: if Kevin Durant had been healthy, this Pelicans team likely would have been left out of the playoffs. But the Pelicans faced their share of bad luck this season, too. They showed grit and toughness to sneak by the Thunder in the final weeks of the season for a spot in the playoffs.
The task in the future isn't easy, though. They're not guaranteed to make a jump in the West. Most of the teams above them in the Western Conference standings should be great next year, too. The Portland Trail Blazers could lose LaMarcus Aldridge and the Dallas Mavericks are getting older, but the Warriors, the Rockets and the Spurs aren't going anywhere. Plus the Thunder should have Durant back.
The Pelicans are likely to keep their core players intact, and each of their players will need to improve. Davis just keeps getting better and better and is a serious threat to win the MVP next year. The future for the Pelicans’ role players is bright, too: no one on this year’s roster was older than 30.
The Pelicans have to get better. They have the tools to do so. It all seems more possible when Davis is on the court.
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