The Charlotte Hornets are parting ways with head coach James Borrego after another play-in tournament elimination. The team has consistently improved the level in the past couple of seasons, yet they’ve been unable to make it to the postseason despite having one of the most promising young players in the league, LaMelo Ball.
The Hornets couldn’t win a game in the play-in, as Trae Young and the Atlanta Hawks dominated him and left them out of playoffs consideration. A couple of days after that, the Hornets made a surprising decision for some people, letting Borrego go.
Adrian Wojnarowski of ESPN reports that the team is cutting ties with the head coach, who signed a multi-year extension last year.
The Charlotte Hornets are firing coach James Borrego, sources told ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski.
Borrego, 44, was 138-163 in four seasons as Hornets coach. Charlotte finished 10th in the Eastern Conference each of the past two seasons but was eliminated in the first play-in game each year.
The move also comes after the Hornets improved their win total by 10 games each of the past two seasons, finishing 43-39 in 2021-22.
The Hornets had reached a multiyear extension with Borrego in August.
The Hornets have a good young core that can make some noise in the future, but it looks like the franchise doesn’t seem Borrego as the right man to lead them. Charlotte has big expectations for the future, and they need to keep developing their young players before becoming a playoffs team or championship contender. Nobody has named any potential candidates yet, but that job will certainly attract a lot of attention in the next couple of days.
