A roadblock in Chicago: Offense stumbles again for Charlotte Hornets in 108-91 loss to Bulls

Figuring out what's ailing the Charlotte Hornets at the moment becomes clear with a quick glimpse at their final score tally lately. Finding the perfect solution to fix the lingering issue, however, is another thing.

Let's begin with obvious: after succumbing to Chicago 108-91 on Thursday night, marking the fourth time in the past six games they haven't topped 97 points, the Hornets' main problem is simple.

"It’s tough to score right now," coach James Borrego said. "Bottom line. It’s tough to score. So we’ll carry on and find ways and answers to put the ball in the hole. It’s put tremendous pressure on our defense. The inability to make shots and put the ball in the hole, it’s tough. Our defense is pretty good when we get set, but we’ve just got to continue to fight."

Generating enough offense without having the likes of LaMelo Ball, Gordon Hayward and Malik Monk has been quite the challenge for the Hornets, who've lost six of their last seven games. It was expected, given the individual playmaking each possess. Their ability to create shots for themselves and others made things so much easier and their absence is being magnified with these lengthy scoring droughts that are so prevalent.

Avoiding the snowball effect has been a difficult proposition.

"Anybody that’s been a basketball player, you are going to get discouraged when guys hit shots," Caleb Martin said. "You want to be able to alter guys’ shots and make them miss as much as possible. But I mean that’s just the game of basketball, especially in the NBA. I think early on in the season, with all those guys, we were just able to cover it up an manage it better because we had guys who we could come back and just score right away, right off the bat and we would trade baskets and sometimes we would be on the better end of it.

"I just think that now we need to focus on the defensive end. And nights like tonight when we’re not going to hit shots, we need to let our defense win the game for us. So we just need to continue to hunker down on the defensive end and just find ways to get stops early on from the jump."

Speaking of which, Borrego didn't dismiss the possibility of altering things with the starting five. PJ Washington has been a reserve since returning from a sprained ankle and Vernon Carey Jr. has continued to begin the game at center.

That, though, could change.

"We’re looking at all these options," Borrego said. "We’ll look to see if we need to make a change there in the starting lineup. I’ll look at it. PJ had a good run the last couple of games. I’ll continue to start Miles (Bridges) at the '4.' We’ve tried Vern the last couple of nights. It’s worked fairly well with (PJ)  coming off the bench the couple of nights we’ve done it before this. I did’t see much there tonight, but we’ll continue to look at the starting lineup.

"Maybe there is something we can do. I’m not married to the starting lineup. We could see a different group tomorrow. We’ve just got to keep plugging, keep looking for different things. I’m not going to just sit here on my heels and hope that this turns. I’ll continue to try some different looks, different lineups. Maybe it starts with the starters with a different look."

Quotable: "I think we’ve had some good three looks. I do. Not all of them are poor looks, not a lot of them are great looks. But I think we are getting good looks from three. I watched the Knicks game and we had good looks there. Look, if we can’t make threes it’s going to tough for us to score 90 points every night. That’s just the reality. We’ve got to continue to shoot threes, we’ve got to make some threes. We scored 91 again tonight. That’s going to be our range if we can’t make threes." -- James Borrego on the Hornets going 8 of 31 from 3-point range against Chicago and making just 11 of their last 51 overall

Noteworthy: In back-to-back games this season, the Hornets are 10-13. They are 5-7 on the front end, have split the games four times and been swept four times. 

Up next: vs. Cleveland, 8 p.m. Friday