Look, we need to get something straight right off the bat: summer league basketball has about as much bearing on the regular NBA season as your fantasy football draft does on actual NFL outcomes. 😅 But hey, that doesn’t mean Charlotte fans can’t enjoy a good old-fashioned victory lap right now!
The Hornets just wrapped up a perfect 6-0 summer league run in Las Vegas, capping it off with an 83-78 win over Sacramento to claim their first summer league title. And honestly? It was pretty fun to watch unfold.
Kon Knueppel, Charlotte’s shiny new fourth overall pick, put up 21 points in the championship game and earned MVP honors after averaging 18.3 points over his final four contests. The Duke product even delivered the dagger—a clutch 3-pointer with 31 seconds left that essentially sealed the deal. “Like I said before, if you’re going to come here, you should win,” Knueppel said with the confidence of someone who clearly hasn’t experienced a full NBA season yet.
Ryan Kalkbrenner chipped in 15 points, while three other Hornets each dropped 11 in what became a total team effort. Sacramento’s Isaac Jones went off for 24 points and 11 rebounds in the loss, and Devin Carter added 13, but it wasn’t enough to prevent the Kings from falling short of their third summer league title.
The game had all the drama you’d want in a championship: Charlotte jumped out to a massive 36-18 lead in the second quarter, Sacramento clawed all the way back with Jones cutting the deficit to just one point twice in the final minutes, and the Hornets ultimately closed things out at the free-throw line like champions do.
Sure, there was some typical summer league chaos—James Banks III got ejected for a flagrant 2 elbow that left a Sacramento player sprawled on the court—but that’s just part of the Vegas experience.
So what does this actually mean for Charlotte? Probably not much when October rolls around. Summer league is where rookies get their feet wet, fringe players fight for roster spots, and teams experiment with lineups they’d never dream of running in real games. The competition is inconsistent, the rotations are weird, and half the league’s actual stars are somewhere on a beach right now.
But here’s why Hornets fans should still be smiling: Knueppel looked comfortable and confident in his first taste of professional basketball, the young core showed some chemistry, and winning is always better than losing—even if it’s just in Vegas during the dog days of summer.
Take the W, Charlotte. Enjoy the championship parade-ish (if there is one around The Green or Marshall Park). Just remember that the real test starts when the leaves change and the games actually count.