{"id":692016,"date":"2026-04-01T14:38:57","date_gmt":"2026-04-01T14:38:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/692016\/"},"modified":"2026-04-01T14:38:57","modified_gmt":"2026-04-01T14:38:57","slug":"lamelo-ball-reaches-new-career-milestone-vs-nets-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/692016\/","title":{"rendered":"LaMelo Ball reaches new career milestone vs. Nets"},"content":{"rendered":"

Following back-to-back tough losses at home against the Philadelphia 76ers<\/a> and Boston Celtics<\/a>, the Hornets<\/a> traveled to Brooklyn Tuesday for a much easier matchup against the Brooklyn Nets<\/a> who sit 13th in the Eastern Conference standings with an 18-57 record.<\/p>\n

Once again, LaMelo Ball got the start for Charlotte, appearing in his 66th contest of the year.<\/p>\n

The game also marked Ball’s 50th consecutive game played, a new record<\/a> for the former No. 3 overall pick.<\/p>\n

Averaging just 46 games played per season over his first five years, Ball is set to have his second-most durable season after appearing in 75 games during his sophomore campaign (2021-22).<\/p>\n

All the while, the former Chino Hills High School product has been performing.<\/p>\n

Although his points per game totals are the lowest since his rookie season, he’s excelled as a playmaker alongside both Brandon Miller and Kon Knueppel.<\/p>\n

With that in mind, Ball is still averaging a respectable 19.7 points, seven assists, 4.8 rebounds and 1.2 steals.<\/p>\n

His play has helped Charlotte to their best record since the 2021-22 season (43-39). The team has also already clinched a Play-In Tournament position, giving them a chance to fight for their first playoff appearance since the 2015-16 season where they finished sixth in the conference.<\/p>\n

That said, their path may still prove difficult. If the Hornets finish with the ninth or 10th seed, they’ll have to win back-to-back road games in order to make the playoffs.<\/p>\n

In the meantime, as Charlotte eyes a top-eight seed, they’ll face the Suns<\/a> at home Thursday.<\/p>\n

More NBA news:<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Following back-to-back tough losses at home against the Philadelphia 76ers and Boston Celtics, the Hornets traveled to Brooklyn…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":620201,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3767],"tags":[7,670,247,3803,6,671],"class_list":{"0":"post-692016","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-brooklyn-nets","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-brooklyn","10":"tag-brooklyn-nets","11":"tag-brooklynnets","12":"tag-nba","13":"tag-nets"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/116329969339788411","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/692016","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=692016"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/692016\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/620201"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=692016"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=692016"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=692016"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}