New Orleans Sweeps Portland to Advance in NBA Playoffs

If the New Orleans Pelicans aren’t on your radar as a possible challenger to be the NBA Western Conference champion, it might be worth considering them.

On April 21st, the sixth seeded Pelicans beat Portland 131-123 to complete a four game sweep of the third seeded Trailblazers in New Orleans. The Pelicans got a powerful 1-2 punch from Anthony Davis (47 points, 11 rebounds) and Jrue Holiday (41 points, 8 assists). Rajon Rondo, who is playing on his fourth team in five years, contributed 16 assists.

It appeared that any chance for the Pelicans to be a major factor in the West race went out the window when DeMarcus Cousins suffered a season ending Achilles injury in the team’s January 26th win over Houston. Cousins was averaging 25.2 points and 12.9 rebounds per game when he went down, which is a lot of production to replace. But the team averaged 111.7 points per game for the season, third in the league, despite losing Cousins for the final 2 1/2 months.

New Orleans awaits the winner of the Golden State–San Antonio first round series, with the Warriors leading the Spurs 3 games to 1. If we do have a Pelicans vs. Warriors Round 2 matchup, it could very well hinge on if Golden State’s Stephen Curry can return from his knee injury.