Are the Charlotte Hornets a Top-Five Team in the NBA?

A recent two-game losing streak against high-level foes shouldn’t remove us all from having this title discussion.

So, after Bleacher Report's NBA Power Rankings listed Charlotte sixth overall on their newest rankings, it got me thinking pretty hard. Frankly, I think there’s a good case to be made for fifth-or-better when the Hornets are playing at their best.

Let me not get too far ahead of myself.

From No. 5 to No. 1, the five teams ranked above the Hornets in the newest power rankings were Cleveland, Detroit, Boston, Oklahoma City, and San Antonio.

Coincidentally (or perhaps not…), the only five teams to have better records than Charlotte, in the same order, are predictably the five teams I listed above who were ranked higher.

As of Friday, following a win against the Indiana Pacers, the 23-win year-over-year increase from 2024-2025’s 19 wins to 2025-2026's (currently) 42 is the largest win change from one year to the next in franchise history.

While we have all discussed their net ratings with the starting five of LaMelo Ball, Kon Knueppel, Brandon Miller, Miles Bridges, and Moussa Diabaté, that year-over-year stat is what matters way more than if they’re worthy of a top five ranking, to me.

Power rankings are for a team like OKC, a team that has a right to have some qualms with being second instead of first as the defending champions. Teams that are undoubtedly in a win-now window.

Before Moussa was inserted as a Hornets starter in late December? The very LAST thing any of us would have called this season is a season that is part of a Hornets “win now” window. Despite all of it, the Hornets are here with the best of them.

Next year is the season to be focused on how you fare against the league’s top teams in both conferences. 2026-2027, the Hornets WILL have expectations.

So, do I think the Charlotte Hornets are a top-five NBA team right now? No, and that should be okay. This is a team that had 19 wins last year and had questions about its returning star players, who were coming off season-ending injuries.

What’s most important is that right now, hanging with these big teams when they weren’t expected to do so, is what WILL make the Hornets a top-five caliber team in the long run. The battles, toughness, and strategies you learn when contenders take you seriously in the regular season are incredibly underrated.

Charlotte has a LOT of that now. More than Hornets players in their sixth season, like LaMelo Ball, have ever had. Same for Miles Bridges, the only longer-tenured Hornet (seventh season).

Fans have the play-in and this year’s playoffs on their mind right now, when really, what everyone is missing here in the last few weeks of the season?

We all have to remember the future we're looking forward to with this young team. A future capable of being a top-five NBA unit, without needing any think piece explaining it.

Just not quite yet. Patience is a virtue, friends.

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