Zion confident in health, Pelicans’ playoff prospects
NEW ORLEANS — Pelicans rookie Zion Williamson credits his mother’s wisdom with helping him manage life’s unanticipated twists and inevitable assortment of successes and setbacks.
It has served the NBA’s top overall draft choice well during a highly unusual debut season that has gone nothing like he imagined yet still holds plenty of promise.
“The last 12 months have been a different experience,” Williamson said Thursday, projecting his typically affable, smiling, easygoing manner during a video conference at the New Orleans Pelicans’ practice headquarters. “My mom tells me, ‘Life is life. You may go through a lot of bad times. You may go through a lot of good times. It’s just: Try to prepare yourself as best as you can.’ ”
Williamson and the Pelicans are preparing to make a “playoff push,” something that appeared highly unlikely when he was sitting on the sidelines with a surgically repaired knee, watching New Orleans labor through a franchise-worst 13-game losing streak that left the club with a record of 6-22.
“I think this team can be really special when we’re all healthy,” Williamson said.
The 6-foot-6, 285-pound Williamson was expected to be out six to eight weeks when he had surgery to repair his torn right lateral meniscus the day before the regular season. He missed about three months and 44 games. When he returned Jan. 22, fans packed the stands and Williamson routinely delighted them with aroundthe-rim highlights.
Williamson averaged 23.6 points and 6.8 rebounds in 19 games. New Orleans won 10 of those games and looked to be gaining momentum when the season was suspended March 11 because of the pandemic.
Still, that stint kept the Pelicans close enough to the playoff picture — 3½ games behind Memphis for the eighth and final playoff seed in the Western Conference — to be included among 22 NBA teams that will finish their regular seasons in Orlando, Fla., starting July 30.
Pelicans guard Josh Hart said Williamson’s addition to the lineup “made us a more aggressive, more dynamic.”
“If we had him in the beginning of the year, the story wouldn’t be fighting for the eighth seed,” Hart said. “It would have been, we’re the four or five seed in the West, honestly.”
Williamson quickly developed an on-court synergy with creative, playmaking, up-tempo point-guard Lonzo Ball. Williamson was praised by teammates and coaches for an unselfishness that has allowed other players like Pelicans leading scorer Brandon Ingram to continue to flourish.