Hornets Venom GT: The Slam Tournament Preview

Hornets Venom GT, the official NBA 2K League affiliate of the Charlotte Hornets, got off to a rocky start to season five. Failing to make it to bracket play of the Tipoff, Venom will look to right the ship for the upcoming three-on-three tournament, the Slam.

In a never-before-seen twist added to season five, teams will compete in a three-on-three, full-court, first-to-21, best-of-five series of group play matches. After two weeks of group play, the top contenders from each group will advance to bracket play, which will eventually crown a winner.

Venom has a favorable group this time around. Although their Tipoff group was monstrously difficult, Venom are paired with fellow NBA 2K League squads Hawks Talon, Heat Check, and an amateur team, Team Smoke.

For Venom, the hardest decision is going to be choosing the trio of players to represent the Hornets on the virtual hardwood. Glennratty is certainly going to be one piece of the puzzle. While he will take the primary ball-handler position, who will join him on the court?

Crown is having a Defensive Player of the Year type of season, Nick is one of the best one-on-one locks in the league, King Haad can provide more of an offensive punch by adding another guard, and DJ led the Tipoff in rebounds per game at the center position. From these four players, Venom will have to select two to join Glennratty on a game-to-game basis.

Thankfully, each series is a best-of-five and teams can rotate players in and out after each game. This means that if the players see something that is not working well, they can adapt on the fly and make the necessary lineup adjustments.

Conversely, changing a lineup too much might make it harder to find consistency and rhythm with teammates. That is the beauty of this style of three-on-three tournament. In the league’s first ever three-vs-three effort, there are bound to be teams that struggle, and there are going to be teams that run away with a series or two.

Venom hope to be in the latter camp rather than the former. With the Slam tipping off on Tuesday, April 26, only time will tell which side of the coin falls face-up for Venom.