Gentry rips Pelicans players, coaches for 'piss-poor effort' vs. Nets

Nothing went right for the New Orleans Pelicans on Friday night.

The team gave up 143 points to the Brooklyn Nets at Smoothie King Center, becoming only the second team to drop a home game to the league's worst club.

Head coach Alvin Gentry didn't mince words about the Pelicans' performance, saying they got their "ass kicked."

"Everything sucked," the bench boss told reporters following the blowout loss. "The effort that we played with sucked, the coaching sucked, the ball movement. Everything about it was just horrendous. There's no way of sugar coating it."

The Pels are in a dog fight with about half the West for the conference's final playoff seed and entered the game with a top-10 defense. Friday's affair against Brooklyn stood out as a must-win, as it preceded visits from four postseason-bound teams. Instead, New Orleans laid an egg, allowing its opponent to net a season-high 143 points on 57.8 percent shooting, with eight players scoring in double digits.

"(The Nets) kicked our ass," Gentry said. "In just plain English, they kicked our ass. In every phase of the game, they did. Three-point shooting, rebounding, hustling, driving the ball to the basket. Everything that you can talk about basketball, there was not one phase of the game that we won - not one."

The 62-year old wasn't done there. He expressed disappointment in his team - both the players and coaches - over a lack of game-readiness.

"It was a really piss-poor effort. All-around ... Point the finger at the coaches, too. It's not just the players. We gotta be better, and we gotta be better in a day. And I guarantee you we'll get it done tomorrow at practice. We won't have this kind of effort again."

To add insult to injury, All-Star starter Anthony Davis exited the contest in the third quarter with a right quadriceps contusion, and Gentry admitted his status remains up in the air for Monday's game versus the Cleveland Cavaliers.