Coby White Opens Up About Minutes Restriction After Hornets Season Debut

Coby White started Monday night in his season debut for the Charlotte Hornets and played 15:55 in a 124-91 home loss to the Detroit Pistons.

Before the game, Hornets coach Charles Lee said White would be on a minutes restriction for the next few games. Charlotte had cleared White to make his season debut by leaving him off Sunday's injury report.

White came out of the night feeling good and excited to be back on the floor.

"Game a lot different than the stay-ready game," White said. "Playing pickup with everybody. But, nah, it was fun. I knew how many minutes I was going to play. I knew how [it] was going to shake out before the game even started. So my mind was kind of already wrapped around that."

"But obviously it's challenging because you want to be out there, you want to compete, but that's the situation it is right now," White continued. "And I can sit here and complain about it, but I'm blessed to be out there getting the opportunity I do to get to play the game. So I knew how much I was going to play."

His minutes came in three stretches: 4:30 in the first quarter, 5:15 in the second, and 6:10 in the third. He did not play in the fourth.

White checked out for the final time with 5:50 left in the third quarter and Charlotte trailing 79-73. Detroit outscored the Hornets 45-18 from there.

He finished with 7 points on 3-of-9 shooting, including 1-of-5 from 3-point range, with 3 assists and 3 turnovers. His first basket was a 29-foot 3-pointer off a Sion James pass that put Charlotte ahead 9-8 midway through the first quarter. All 3 of his assists came in the third, on 3-pointers by Naz Reid, James, and Reid again over a 66-second span.

With 9:35 left in the second quarter, officials called him for a technical foul after a driving layup.

Every other Hornet who played finished with a negative plus-minus. White was plus-1.

Dennis Schröder had been starting with White out. He came off the bench Monday and played 22:33.

Part of the fix, to White, is physicality. The rest is the Hornets making smarter decisions.

"Getting off screens, reading what the defense is doing in terms of are they switching off ball, are they maintaining," White explained. "A lot of teams have certain guys that maintain. Do we want to put those guys in more of the actions, so you can't switch? The point of switching off ball is to take away the action. And Detroit has a lot of options to where they can switch off ball and take away the actions. So reading that, slips to the basket during those moments."

"It's growing pain," White continued. "It ain't gonna change overnight."

On Oct. 5, Charlotte announced White had strained his left calf during training camp at The Citadel and would miss the preseason. Lee said three days before the opener that there was still no timeline for White or Kon Knueppel.

A left calf strain also delayed White's first game with Charlotte last season. Chicago traded him to the Hornets on Feb. 4, and he debuted Feb. 24 against the Bulls at the United Center. In July, he signed a three-year, $74 million deal to stay.

His last game before Monday was the April 17 play-in loss to the Orlando Magic.

White said he probably played a little more Monday than he was supposed to.

"I don't know as much as y'all know," White said. "Whatever he said, all I know is for a while. I don't know what a while means, but for a while."

Knueppel, out with a left hamstring strain, has not played this season either. Lee said Monday that Knueppel's return is "right around the corner," according to the AP, and the team has started adding contact drills to his 5-on-5 work.