Rod Walker: Zion Williamson did his part vs. Lakers. Too bad Pelicans didn't give him help (2024)

This was the type of night Zion Williamson promised the city of New Orleans five years ago when he stared into the camera on draft night and said “Let’s Dance.”

For 36 minutes Tuesday night, Williamson did just that, dazzling the crowd and a national TV audience in his first ever postseason game.

Unfortunately for Williamson, he didn’t have any dance partners.

The Pelicans’ other starters were pretty much no-shows in what ended up being a 110-106 loss to the nemesis Los Angeles Lakers in a play-in tournament game.

Williamson finished with 40 points, 11 rebounds and five assists.

He perhaps could have gotten the "W" to go with that stat line if one of two things had happened:

1. He had some help, or...

2. He didn’t exit the game and head to the locker room with 3:13 remaining with an injury.

Pelicans head coach Willie Green described the injury afterwards as “leg soreness” and said imaging would be done Wednesday. A report from The Athletic late Tuesday night called it a left hamstring injury.

Perhaps it came from all the heavy lifting Williamson had to endure on this night as he tried to single-handedly put the team on his back and carry them into the playoffs. Instead, the Pelicans will have to wait until Friday to try to punch their playoff ticket when they host the Sacramento Kings in a win-or-go-home game.

The Pelicans are 5-0 against the Kings this season, but may have to win a sixth game without their best player. They did that once already this season, beating Sacramento 133-100 in January without Zion.

But the stakes will be much higher this time. The Pelicans' chances will be much better with Williamson, who was the best player on the court Tuesday. That’s not easy to do when you are sharing a court with LeBron James and Anthony Davis.

James, who lived up to all the lofty expectations put on him when he entered the league in 2003, had high praise for Williamson, who had those same type expectations placed on him when the Pelicans drafted him in 2019.

“He’s a generational player, a generational talent,” James said. “He’s going to continue to get better and better. Tonight was just a small microcosm of how great he can be.”

Williamson shot 17 of 27 from the floor and was just three points shy of matching his career-high in points.

“He did whatever he wanted tonight,” said CJ McCollum.

Well, everything except finish the game and get a win. It didn’t help that the other Pelicans starters went a combined 13 of 41 from the floor. That includes 8 of 27 from the other two members of the Pels’ Big 3 of McCollum (4 of 15) and Brandon Ingram (4 of 12).

“I’ve got to be better. I’ve got to be more efficient,” McCollum said. “If I play a better game tonight, we end up winning.”

Ingram, in his second game back from a knee injury, sat the final 7:38 of the game. Green’s lineup of Williamson, Herb Jones, Larry Nance, Jose Alvarado and Trey Murphy sparked the comeback in a game the Pels trailed by as many as 18. Even when Williamson headed to the locker room, Green decided to keep Ingram on the bench.

“I just liked the group that was on the floor at the time,” Green explained. “B.I. is still getting back. Still getting his rhythm. So I didn’t want to force the issue. I liked the group that was going.”

On this night, nobody had it going quite like Williamson.

“That dude is incredible,” said Pelicans’ forward Larry Nance. “My vocabulary is pretty expansive, but I don’t have the words to describe his performance tonight and how he’s shouldered us all season.”

It's a season that has seen Williamson in the best shape of his career, a big reason the team won 49 games.

Now, it's a season that very well could have just one more game left in it.

Williamson’s availability for Friday night will have a lot to do with that.

The good news is Williamson wasn’t walking with a limp when he left the Smoothie King Center Tuesday night.

The bad news is he wasn’t walking out with a win either, which is too bad considering how dominant he was in his first postseason game.