As the New Orleans Pelicans return to action on Friday following the All-Star break, the team will have 27 games remaining to lock down a playoff berth.
The Pelicans enter the day five games back of the Memphis Grizzlies in the eighth and final playoff spot in the Western Conference. With so much on the line, Pelicans head coach Alvin Gentry on Thursday compared the final run to a college basketball team trying to qualify for the NCAA Tournament.
With the team vying for playoff positioning, they will have a decision to make on the status of Zion Williamson in select situations.
Once Williamson returned from knee surgery last month, the approach was to sit him during back-to-back games. Since Williamson debuted on Jan. 22, though, the Pelicans haven’t faced any back-to-backs but will have four such sets over the remainder of the season with the first one March 3-4.
Gentry said the team has not decided how they will handle that situation.
[We] haven’t even really thought about it yet. I’m sure what will happen is we’ll see where he is when those come about. As far as decisions right now, we haven’t made any on if he is going to play or not play on back to backs.
Depending on how the schedule falls, the Pelicans could opt to rest him on the first game or the second game in those scenarios. Of course, the team could also play him on one set and sit him one game during another set so they will have several options to weigh in the coming weeks.
Williamson is averaging 22.1 points, 7.5 rebounds and 2.2 assists in 10 games this season. He is playing 27.4 minutes per game and has logged over 30 minutes in four of his 10 games played.
Williamson hasn’t experienced any setbacks to this point as his workload increased which could bode well for his chances of playing in back-to-back games.
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