According to a Yahoo! Sports report, the New Orleans Hornets will change their name to the Pelicans, possible next season. Tom Benson, who also owns the Saints, purchased the NBA team in April and owns the rights to the Pelicans name.

Louisiana is the Pelican State, and the brown pelican is the state bird.

The Hornets relocated from Charlotte in 2002. Michael Jordan , who owns the Bobcats — the team that replaced the Hornets in Charlotte — recently said that he would consider changing his team’s name to Hornets if the name became available.

According to a report from USA Today, Saints owner Tom Benson will branch out to basketball and become the sole owner of the Hornets, buying the team from the NBA for $338 million.

The report indicates that the sale needs to be approved at Friday’s Board of Governors meeting in New York.

The NBA bought the Hornets for approximately $318 million from George Shinn in 2010 and has operated the franchise since then.

The report comes one day after Benson’s Saints announced that assistant coach Joe Vitt will serve as interim head coach for Sean Payton despite facing a six-game suspension for his role in the team’s bounty scandal. Payton’s year-long suspension begins Monday.