The NBA's lowest-scoring team meets its worst rebounding team in Phoenix

The Hornets have not reached 100 points a night all season, the only team in the NBA that can say so. The Suns pull down fewer rebounds than any of the other 29. Thursday in Phoenix puts those two extremes on the same floor, three days after Charlotte produced its best offensive game of the year with half its rotation sidelined.

Charles Lee's Hornets are 4-7 and arrive on the back of a 124-112 win over Cleveland at Spectrum Center on November 9 that ended a six-game losing streak. Jordan Ott's Suns are 4-6 and play the fourth game of a seven-game homestand: a 96-122 loss to San Antonio on Monday, then a 133-110 win over the Clippers on Tuesday with 13 players scoring.

• Competition: NBA 2026-27 regular season.
• Matchup: Charlotte Hornets at Phoenix Suns (official NBA game ID 0022600230).
• Tip-off: Thursday, November 12, 7 p.m. in Phoenix (9 p.m. ET); 02:00 UTC on Friday the 13th.
• Venue: Mortgage Matchup Center, Phoenix, Arizona.
• Series: first meeting of 2026-27; Phoenix has won three of the last five, and the home team has won four of them.

Charlotte is 30th in nearly everything that involves scoring

Through 11 games the Hornets rank last in the NBA in points (98.8), field-goal percentage (40.0), assists (21.5) and offensive rating (101.9), and they give the ball away more often than anyone at 19.0 turnovers a game. They also attempt fewer free throws than any other team, though they convert them at 82.4 percent, the fourth-best mark in the league.

Their defense is not the problem. They give up 110.4 points, the 10th-fewest, allow the second-lowest volume of field-goal attempts and concede fewer offensive rebounds than anyone. A defensive rating of 113.7 puts them in the middle of the pack. The minus-11.8 net rating is almost entirely an offensive bill.

Which is what made November 9 stand out. Charlotte scored 124 on 44-of-93 shooting, went 23 of 46 from three, grabbed 49 rebounds including 17 on the offensive glass and handed out 29 assists — season highs in points, three-pointers made, three-point percentage and assists. Its 17 turnovers came in under the 19.0 average and left the Hornets their widest assist-to-turnover margin of the season. Grayson Allen scored 27 with six threes on 12 attempts, Naz Reid added 25 points and 13 rebounds, Ryan Kalkbrenner pulled down 15 rebounds with three blocks in 35 minutes and Tidjane Salaün came off the bench for 14. Ten players saw the floor.

Phoenix swung 37 points in 24 hours

The Suns have been swinging between extremes. Monday brought a 96-122 home loss to San Antonio on 39 percent shooting and 35 rebounds. Tuesday they shot 49 of 88, made 22 of 43 from deep, assisted on 32 baskets and beat the Clippers 133-110. Devin Booker played 29 minutes and scored 17 because the night did not require more: Jordan Goodwin went 6 of 7 from three for 18 points in 14 minutes, Luke Kennard scored 14 and Collin Gillespie finished with 12 points and eight assists.

Booker averages 25.1 points and 4.8 assists on 48.3 percent shooting. Dillon Brooks contributes 14.9 points while shooting 42.2 percent from three; Jalen Green averages 11.8 on 42.6 percent overall. As a team Phoenix shoots 37.6 percent from beyond the arc, sixth in the NBA, and takes care of the ball with 14.5 turnovers a game.

The ledger turns at the glass. Phoenix averages 39.7 rebounds, fewest in the league, and ranks 30th in both total rebound percentage and defensive rebound percentage. Its leading rebounder is a forward, Miles Bridges, at 7.4. It allows 118.1 points, and its 119.3 defensive rating ranks 27th. The 49 boards against the Clippers were a season high, not a habit.

Two careers that traded places

Allen returns to the building where he spent three seasons. He played 190 games for the Suns from 2023-24 through 2025-26 before signing with Charlotte, where he is now the team's most accurate three-point shooter at 46.9 percent. Going the other way, Bridges spent seven seasons and 501 regular-season games with the Hornets, from 2018-19 through 2025-26, and faces his former club for the first time in a Phoenix uniform.

The third name in that exchange will not play. Mark Williams, the center Charlotte drafted and used from 2022-23 through 2024-25, is out after left shoulder surgery, leaving the five spot to Khaman Maluach — 8.1 points and 6.4 rebounds in 19.8 minutes on 61.5 percent shooting — and Oso Ighodaro.

Availability

The league's official injury report now lists this game, but without designations: the document filed at 1:30 a.m. ET on Wednesday the 11th shows both Charlotte and Phoenix as not yet submitted. Both teams face a 5 p.m. local deadline Wednesday. The designations below come from each club's availability report as of early Wednesday.

Charlotte Hornets

• Dennis Schröder: out — left hamstring strain. Has not played since November 4 at Brooklyn.
• Kon Knueppel: out — left hamstring strain. One appearance and 5.9 minutes this season.
• Grant Williams: out — right hamstring. Has yet to play in 2026-27.
• Brandon Miller: day-to-day — right groin soreness. Last played November 6 against Boston.
• Moussa Diabaté: day-to-day — right quadriceps. Also last played November 4.

Phoenix Suns

• Mark Williams: out — left shoulder surgery.

Charlotte's absences hit the backcourt and the frontcourt at once. Schröder leads the team with 4.9 assists a game; without him the ball-handling falls to Coby White, four games into his season and shooting 23.7 percent from the field, and to Allen, who had six assists against Cleveland. Miller is the leading scorer at 20.6 points, though on 35.6 percent shooting and 26.0 percent from three. Diabaté, at 9.1 rebounds and 63.5 percent from the field, is the team's most productive rebounder. Day-to-day is not a return: Thursday's report will settle whether either is available.

Where the game turns

The glass, strength against weakness. Charlotte leads the NBA in offensive rebounds at 15.0 a game and has the best defensive rebounding percentage in the league. Phoenix is 30th in rebounds and in rebound percentage and is playing without its starting center. Another 17-offensive-rebound night of the kind Charlotte had against Cleveland would hand the Hornets the second chances their shooting percentages require.

Three-point volume against a soft defense. No team launches more threes than Charlotte: 44.6 attempts a night at 30.8 percent, 28th in the league. The defense across from them concedes 118.1 points. The arithmetic flips at the other end, where the Hornets allow opponents to shoot 40.8 percent from three, the worst figure in the NBA, and Phoenix sends Brooks (42.2 percent), Kennard (48.7) and Goodwin (48.4) to that line.

Ball security. The Suns average 27.6 assists against 14.5 turnovers; the Hornets, 21.5 and 19.0, the worst ratio of the two in the league. Against Cleveland the gap ran their way by more than on any other night this season, 29 assists to 17 turnovers. Without Schröder, repeating that falls to players who are not primary playmakers.

How to watch Hornets–Suns

• Venue: Mortgage Matchup Center, Phoenix.
• Date and time: Thursday, November 12, 7 p.m. in Phoenix (Arizona does not change its clocks); 02:00 UTC on Friday the 13th.

United States — Thursday 12, 9 p.m. ET / 8 p.m. CT / 6 p.m. PT

• TV: no national broadcast. In the Phoenix market the league assigns the feed to 3TV / Arizona's Family Sports (KTVK/KPHE), whose listing has coverage beginning at 6:30 p.m. Arizona time, half an hour before tip-off. In the Charlotte market it goes to TV 64 (WAXN) and the Hornets channel on DAZN.
• Streaming: Suns+ in the Phoenix market; NBA League Pass outside the two local markets.
• Radio: SiriusXM nationally, AZ Sports 98.7 FM in Phoenix and WFNZ 92.7 FM in Charlotte.

United Kingdom — Friday 13, 2 a.m. GMT

• TV: no broadcast announced. The Sky Sports basketball schedule lists no NBA game on Thursday the 12th, and the only fixture it carries on Friday the 13th is Toronto Raptors at Philadelphia 76ers.
• Streaming: NBA League Pass.

Australia — Friday 13, 1 p.m. AEDT in Sydney and Melbourne

• TV: no broadcast announced. The game carries no Australian broadcaster in the league's official listing, and the ESPN Australia schedule leaves the channel column empty.
• Other time zones: 12.30 p.m. ACDT in Adelaide, noon AEST in Brisbane, 10 a.m. AWST in Perth.
• Streaming: NBA League Pass.

Charlotte had lost six in a row and then scored 124 without five players; Phoenix went from 96 to 133 in two nights. Thursday starts to show which of those performances was the outlier.