Aw, yeah!

The Hornets beat the Rockets in their preseason opener yesterday, 94-92 (box | recap | photos | video). The result means nothing but I'm reveling in victory just the same. Maybe my ex was right about me being easily excitable.

The Hornets sucked supremely in the early going, missing 17 of their first 19 shots and trailing 30-9 after the first quarter. The second stanza was better, but our guys didn't really make a game of it until the third, when they forced the Rockets into a bunch of turnovers and closed the gap significantly. In the crunch, it came down to New Orleans making free throws and Houston missing them. Game over.

And while there was much meaninglessness, there was some noteworthyness…

• Hilton Armstrong lived up to the training camp hype, posting perhaps the best line of the night: 12 points, 6 boards, 4 blocks, 2 assists and 0 trunovers in 27 minutes. Two of those swats came consecutively against the Yao Ming of the China.
• Adam Haluska somehow outshone Julian Wright, scoring 12 points in 24 minutes and coming up with a few big buckets in the fourth.

  Wright shot horribly (1-of-6 FGs) but gobbled up 8 boards in 10 minutes.

• Peja started cold, then warmed up, finishing with 13 points on 5-of 13 shooting. More encouraging were his words postgame:

  "In the second half I felt better. And I'm just glad I didn't have any problems with my back."

• Morris Peterson: 0-of-6 shooting and 3 turnovers. Ouch.
• Ryan Schwan was disappointed with the brick-fest from the starters but impressed by the Hornets running game:

  …they did try to push the pace, managing 106 posessions for the game. They did get a large number of offensive rebounds(15), but if you halve that to a more standard 8, you still get 99 posessions for the game. That's 9 more than a year ago, which is a significant increase in pace.

All in all, twas a happy occasion with many a smiling child and that fuzzy feeling you get having discovered there's free pizza.

No?

The Hornets flew from OKC to Indianapolis on some kind of winged aircraft last night, and are set to play the Pacers this evening at 6 Central. Check back to read more about them Pacers in the random shizzle I'm about to start writing.