Borrego Not Worried with Recent Three-Point Shooting Struggles: 'Let it Fly'

Charlotte's best weapon is now backfiring on them in a big way.

The Charlotte Hornets have now lost five straight games and it won't get any easier when the Chicago Bulls, who currently sit 1.5 games out of first in the East come to visit on Wednesday night. 

Three-point shooting has carried this team all year long but during this five-game skid, it has been their worst enemy as they have gone 53/193 (27%) from deep. Yes, that's a bad shooting stretch for any team, but for a team that lives and dies by it, it's crucial. Following Monday's loss to the Raptors, I asked head coach James Borrego what he makes of the shooting struggles and what they need to do to get back on track.

“I really go back to the Cleveland game. I loved the offense there and even going back to the last Toronto game, I thought we had a lot of great shots and better looks than we had tonight," Borrego said. "There are adjustments too that we know they make, but we have to continue to shoot the right shots and we need to get the ball down to the rim more, but we just have to take those as well. But I will go back and watch those 40 shots, but most likely, I will be pretty happy with those 40 shots and the shots we got out of those 40. There were shots at the rim in the first half that could’ve sustained us, but when the rim has dried up and the 3-ball, it leads to where we score 40 points in a half. That is not our identity and there is nothing different here. We just have to trust it and keep working to get better every day.”

Borrego makes a good point here about finishing at the rim. This is one glaring problem that has popped up over the past couple of weeks that gets overlooked because of three-point shooting woes. Unofficially, they are making about 50% of their shots at the rim and having that low of a percentage isn't ideal when you're having trouble knocking down threes to bail you out. Decision-making has to improve when the ball gets inside. They have to do a better job of knowing when to kick the ball back out versus going up for a contested shot on a big. 

Despite the struggles from deep, Borrego doesn't want his guys to lose confidence in their shots. He wants them to let them keep shooting it, knowing that eventually shots are going to go down. 

"I'm okay with the 40, if they're the right 40. What I don't want is these guys to be indecisive and I can think of a couple where we probably turned down a few because maybe I missed a couple. That's just human nature and you start to doubt yourself. I don't want these guys overthinking. Let it fly. If that's your shot, let if fly and trust in it."

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