The New Orleans Pelicans embraced a lineup change for Dejounte Murray's return, toppling the Golden State Warriors 113-109.
With the return of Dejounte Murray, the New Orleans Pelicans opted to make a major change to their lineup against the Golden State Warriors. It paid off as they won their second straight game, this one by a score of 113-109.
The Pelicans now improve to 17-42 on the season and will head off on a six-game road trip on the West Coast. This was a big win for them to pick up before being away from home for so long.
For those keeping track, they now own the fifth-worst record in the league. The further their odds for a top-four pick drop, the better.
This was Murray's first game since tearing his Achilles on January 31, 2025. It wasn't perfect, but it was a solid showing for being gone for so long. James Borrego said before the game that he was going to have a minutes restriction, but he still ended up playing 25.
Murray finished with 11 points on 5-of-1`1 from the field with two rebounds, three assists and a steal. He finished with a 0 in the +/- line. He got the first bucket of the game off an assist from DeAndre Jordan, who got another start.
It looked like this was going to be a low-scoring game with both teams under 50 points heading into the locker room. The Warriors had just 39 points in the first half.
That really wasn't due to some major defensive turnaround by New Orleans, but rather just both teams being unable to hit any shots. They were a combined 21-for-85 from beyond the arc in this game.
Golden State's roster has been bitten by an injury bug, leaving them without a lot of their most reliable shooters. As for the Pelicans, they haven't been reliable at shooting threes all season long.
Overall, though, this was a positive look for this new look rotation and they're still waiting for Trey Murphy, Yves Missi and Micah Peavy to return as well, before being fully healthy.
The fact that they benched Derik Queen with Murray's return, and kept DeAndre Jordan in the starting lineup, shows that this team really wants to look at what they have with the veterans together on this team.
It'll be interesting to see how Queen responds to the benching. His effort wasn't bad in this game, and he even had some really strong stretches. He finished +8 on the night.
The bench unit is as strong as ever. At times, Borrego was able to take every starter off the court and the play didn't really drop, especially in the second half.
New Orleans will return to the court on Thursday night against a tanking Utah Jazz team in hopes of their third straight win.