{"id":152939,"date":"2025-07-31T17:50:44","date_gmt":"2025-07-31T21:50:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/?p=152939"},"modified":"2025-10-12T19:04:11","modified_gmt":"2025-10-12T23:04:11","slug":"3-burning-questions-hornets-2025-26-season","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/2025\/07\/31\/3-burning-questions-hornets-2025-26-season\/","title":{"rendered":"3 Burning Questions For Hornets Heading Into 2025-26 Season"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Charlotte Hornets haven’t done much of anything since the NBA named them as the league’s newest expansion team in 2004.<\/p>\n

Even accounting for the 14 seasons of pre-2004 Hornets history that they were allowed to integrate<\/a> after the New Orleans Pelicans’ rebranding, and they’ve never even reached the Eastern Conference Finals. This puts them among the league’s unlucky 10<\/a>; a group that has yet to win a single NBA championship. Even worse, Charlotte has only had one winning record in the past nine seasons.<\/p>\n

All of this leads to the Hornets heading into the 2025-26 season with three burning questions.<\/p>\n

3 Burning Questions For Hornets Heading Into 2025-26 Season<\/h2>\n

Will LaMelo Ball Take The Next Step?<\/h3>\n

For years, Hornets face of the franchise LaMelo Ball<\/a> has demonstrated tantalizing potential. At 6-foot-7, he’s a natural facilitator with a nifty handle and out of the gym shooting range. His street-ball style often electrifies fans and leads to highlight plays, both of which are good for his overall standing in the league. There’s always going to be room for a crowd-pleaser who can put up All-Star numbers.<\/p>\n

Yet, Ball isn’t sharp enough to be the different-maker he could be. His shot-selection, not his shooting touch, is why he has a sub-.430 career field goal percentage and more seasons shooting below 36 percent from 3 than above. His physical tools allow him to hound players at the defensive end but he doesn’t have the will to.<\/p>\n

Up to this point, his immaturity has been excused by his age. Nonetheless, Ball is approaching his sixth NBA season. Now that he’s achieved veteran status, it’s time for him to really<\/em> start playing like one.<\/p>\n

If he does, he’ll likely earn his first All-Star selection since his first All-Star selection (2021-22). From a team standpoint, the Hornets will likely win more. To that point, he didn’t earn a -3.3 career-plus minus because he isn’t productive, but because he doesn’t do enough that doesn’t show up on the stat sheet.<\/p>\n

Year 3 Brandon Miller<\/h3>\n

Nearly as important as Ball’s development is that of 2023 No. 2 pick Brandon Miller<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"Charlotte
Oct 8, 2024; Charlotte, North Carolina, USA; Charlotte Hornets guard LaMelo Ball (1) and forward Brandon Miller (24) at mid court against the Miami Heat during the second half at Spectrum Center. Mandatory Credit: Jim Dedmon-Imagn Images<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

A skilled and versatile combo forward at 6-foot-9, Miller was averaging career-highs of 21.0 points, 4.9 rebounds, 3.6 assists, 1.1 steals and 0.7 blocks per game in 2024-25. He did shoot just 40.3 percent from the field and 35.5 percent from 3 after shooting 44.0 percent from the field and 37.3 percent from 3 as a rookie. However, it’s possible that his efficiency was impacted by his season-ending wrist injury.<\/p>\n

All of that being said, Miller obviously needs to get back to making shots consistently for Hornets to reach their ceiling. Long a point of discussion, it would also behoove him to get to the line more. Indeed, with Charlotte adding Collin Sexton<\/a> and Kon Knueppel<\/a> to the roster in particular, Miller’s scoring averages might naturally decrease. Getting to the charity stripe would help him raise those numbers.<\/p>\n

Can They Make The Playoffs?<\/h3>\n

As previously mentioned, the Hornets have addressed their rather anemic offense by trading for Sexton and drafting Knueppel. Charlotte also added Liam McNeeley<\/a>, who was a top-10 high school recruit<\/a> in the 2024 ESPN 100, via the 2025 NBA Draft<\/a>.<\/p>\n

That being said, Sexton is an aggressive combo guard with a career scoring average of 18.8 points per game. He also sounds like he has the fast track on a starting spot, taking the initiative to ingratiate himself with his new teammates and work on his chemistry<\/a> with Ball immediately after being traded.<\/p>\n

In fact, his intangibles may prove to be as important than his ability to get the ball through the net. His leadership and unbridled passion should both contribute to the Hornets developing a winning culture. For a team that’s too used to losing, Sexton’s outright refusal to lose is a breath of fresh air.<\/p>\n

None of this guarantees that Charlotte will clinch a postseason berth in 2025-26. Nonetheless, they’ve fortified their existing core. Furthermore, a number of Eastern Conference stars on contending teams tore their Achilles late in 2024-25. Ultimately, this provides them with a perfect storm.<\/p>\n

If they can gel quickly enough and stay healthy, their nine-year playoff drought could soon come to an end.<\/p>\n

\n

\u00a9 Jim Dedmon-Imagn Images<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Charlotte Hornets haven’t done much of anything since the NBA named them as the league’s newest expansion team in 2004. Even accounting for the 14 seasons of pre-2004 Hornets history that they were allowed to integrate after the New Orleans Pelicans’ rebranding, and they’ve never even reached the Eastern Conference Finals. This puts them […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5008,"featured_media":152978,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[7,1608,62,556,1248,3],"tags":[4731,1594,49839,823,49784,98,4557,1382],"class_list":["post-152939","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-hornets","category-basketball","category-nba","category-nba-draft","category-nba-season-previews","category-news","tag-brandon-miller","tag-collin-sexton","tag-kon-knueppel","tag-lamelo-ball","tag-liam-mcneeley","tag-nba-draft","tag-nba-offseason","tag-nba-trade"],"modified_by":"Quenton S Albertie","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/152939","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5008"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=152939"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/152939\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":152979,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/152939\/revisions\/152979"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/152978"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=152939"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=152939"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=152939"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}