Hawks Drop Wild One to Pistons

The Atlanta Hawks fell behind by 30 points in the second half, had only scored 33 points at halftime and were without three of their top four scorers against the Detroit Pistons. Sounds like an insufferable and unwatchable game, right?

Wrong. The Pistons completely imploded down the stretch, and the Hawks kept fighting without the services of Dennis Schröder, Kent Bazemore and Ersan Ilyasova. Atlanta kept slicing into that cushiony Pistons lead on seemingly every possession in the 4^th quarter, and they ended up outscoring the Pistons 37-22 in the final period.

In the end, it wasn’t enough, but the Pistons did not look remotely interested in closing out this game as two (yes that’s right, two) different Hawks shooters were fouled at the three-point line in the game’s final 30 seconds.

Fortunately for the Pistons, they were able to hit some late free throws and iced the game, but almost no defense was being played by Detroit, as evidenced by this supremely easy Isaiah Taylor and-1 layup:

The major reason for Atlanta’s downfall on this night was a truly putrid shooting performance from the perimeter. The Hawks shot only 6 of 33 (18.2%) from downtown in this game, and half of those makes came from undrafted rookie Andrew White, who was making his NBA debut.

If the Hawks had been able to hit just three more of those outside shots, they would’ve won this game.

The Pistons were let down by a truly laughable effort in the 4^th quarter, which mirrored poor effort from the Hawks in the 2^nd and 3^rd quarters. Blake Griffin committed a grisly 6 turnovers, though he was only 1 assist shy of a triple-double in a game-high 36 minutes of action.

Despite many Hawks’ fans wishing for a winless rest of the season so that it all but guarantees Atlanta the number-1 overall pick in the 2018 draft, players and coaches do not tank (unless you’re maybe the 2016 Phoenix Suns).

Atlanta fought extremely hard down the end of this game, and their furious comeback fell just short in the end – a rather fitting way to end the first half of the season before the All-Star break for this scrappy, underdog Hawks team.