Pelicans final 17 games prediction: 10-7

The vast majority of back-to-backs this season have been splits, where the Pelicans beat the lesser opponent and lose to the better opponent. That trend will most likely continue.

10-7 means the home, away, and overall win percentages are a little better than the season average.

The recent streak of 9-2 may be a little deceiving. The schedule was quite easy during that stretch. The only difficult teams were against Toronto, Dallas, and Memphis... all of which have not been playing well recently. But credit to the Pelicans for not dropping an unreasonable number of games against those teams that they should beat. They are playing a bit better than they were.

I think 10-7 should be pretty accurate unless the Pelicans go on an unforeseen tear, or more teams rest players than expected.

9 of the games are against playoff teams... 8 of which are Western Conference playoff teams. Two more games are against Phoenix who is a pretty decent team right there in the mix for the 8th spot. 8 of the games are part of a back-to-back.

It's not an easy schedule, and I think 10-7 is optimistic yet realistic because the Pelicans are playing better ball as of late.