The NBA Championship Formula Part II: Three Is A Magic Number

The Pelicans have to shoot better from distance to be considered a legitimate playoff contender.

Entering the 2022-23 NBA season, New Orleans Pelicans fans are expecting a major jump in the standings with the return of a healthy Zion Williamson and the maturation of a lineup that pushed the Phoenix Suns to six games in the opening round of the Western Conference playoffs.

How close are the Pels to being a legitimate championship contender?

To answer that, first there has to be an understanding of the components of a championship NBA team. After looking at the past decade of champions, some trends stand out.

This is part two of a five-part series identifying those keys to victory.

The 3: Making them is more important than taking them

“More shooting” has been the refrain each offseason in New Orleans for what seems like an eternity.

The 2021-22 Pels were not a good three point shooting team, and that’s putting it mildly. New Orleans ranked 24th in attempts at 32.1 per game and 27th in three point percentage, converting a meager 33.2 percent from beyond the arc.

But it’s not the number of attempts that were the problem.

The Phoenix Suns had the best record in the league last season and finished 26th in attempts (31.9). Memphis, who posted a 56-26 record, they were only slightly ahead of the Pels with 32.7 shots from deep each night.

In fact, of the teams ranked 18-30 in three pointers taken, 11 of them made it to at least the play-in, and only four of those teams had losing records.

The top 17? Eight of those teams finished the year below .500.

So, just taking more threes doesn’t necessarily mean the Pelicans will have more success as a team.

Willie Green and his staff have to be more concerned with how accurate this team is from distance.

Going back into the stats, only Dallas, Toronto, and New Orleans made the postseason converting 35 percent or less of their three point attempts. The average winning percentage for the 12 teams in that category was a meager .381. Take the Mavs and Raptors out of the equation and that plummets to .335.

In just the last five years, the NBA champion has finished as low as 23rd in attempts (2020 Lakers). In 2018, with a team that included Steph Curry, Klay Thompson, and Kevin Durant, the Warriors claimed the title ranked 17th with fewer than 29 attempts per game.

However, Golden State was number one in three point percentage. The 2020 Lakers are the only team to win it all while finishing outside of the top ten in three point accuracy (21st), and just four teams in the past decade were lower than fifth.

Not having Zion Williamson wasn’t a valid excuse for the Pelicans poor shooting either. With Zion playing more than three quarters of the 2020-21 season, New Orleans still finished 26th in three point percentage.

The Pels’ problem has been who’s been taking the shots, and the quality of shots taken.

The corner three is the most valuable shot in basketball, and New Orleans was terrible at both creating and converting from the corner. When shooting from above the break, only OKC, Orlando and Detroit were worse.

It certainly didn’t help that Devonte’ Graham, who led the team with 563 attempts, converted at his lowest rate since his rookie season. Nickeil Alexander-Walker took 305 threes and made 31 percent before he was moved to Utah in the CJ McCollum trade. Those two accounted for one-third of the Pels total attempts.

Of the 11 players on the roster with at least 100 threes taken, only McCollum (.394), Trey Murphy (.382), and Jonas Valanciunas (.361) shot better than 35 percent.

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NAW and Josh Hart are both gone. Graham and Garrett Temple saw their roles reduced greatly as the season went on and fans should expect them to see only spot duty this season.

The Pelicans will hopefully get a full season of McCollum, while Murphy gets more attempts. Herb Jones showed he could be a competent shooter and Jose Alvarado got better with each game (yes, he can shoot).

Willie Green also has to be expecting Brandon Ingram to perform better than he did last season. BI’s .327 shooting from long range was by far his worst since coming to New Orleans. Ingram converted nearly 39 percent of his threes from 2019-21.

With the Big Three of Ingram, Zion, and McCollum, there should be plenty of good looks to go around.

This roster has enough shooters to compete. It’s up to the Pels to knock them down when they’re given the opportunity.

A slight improvement will be the difference between fighting for a play-in spot or competing for home court advantage in the first round.

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