If the Atlanta Hawks aren’t going to learn from the past, they are doomed to repeat it. Okay, that was a bit melodramatic for the situation they find themselves in. But blowing a 17-point lead to the Boston Celtics to fall 107-98 drops them to 29-32 and back into the 10-spot in the East with 21 games to go.
On the bright side, the schedule loosens up considerably after they take on the Chicago Bulls on Thursday as part of a stretch that included five games against playoff teams in their last six tries.
However, they are still giving up the big quarter and having issues getting consecutive stops while compounding matters with turnovers and fouls.
At this rate, even if they do make the play-in, they will get bounced rather quickly.
The Hawks fell victim to the big quarter once again versus the Celtics
We just got done telling you how the Hawks still do many of the things that championship teams do offensively. And how their defense had risen to the highly sought-after level of “above average” over their last few games. Then they go and put up 13 points in the third against Boston while giving up 31 to the Celtics who lost Jaylen Brown less than three minutes in and have now won three of their last five.
It wasted a 31-point effort from Trae Young, though, he went just 2-of-7 from three. Bogdan Bogdanovic’s 25 points off of the bench also went to waste.
Danilo Gallinari added 12 points and eight boards but was 1-fo-4 from deep while Kevin Huerter had just nine points on 4-of-13 shooting (1-of-5 3P). Atlanta has now dropped 2-of-3 coming back from the All-Star break.
While their position in the play-in tournament seemed secure at the least, Tuesday also saw the Washington Wizards take down the Detroit Pistons 116-113.
Washington now sits just one game back of the Hawks for the final play-in spot with a head-to-head matchup set for Friday. Unfortunately, it also comes on the second night of a back-to-back that leads with the Bulls.
"“When you are up 15 and they lose one of the top two guys on the team, and if you’re not able to win that game, you’re not a good team.” – via Sarah K. Spence/Atlanta Journal-Constitution"
The Hawks are 0-3 versus Chicago after losing to them 112-108 in their first game following the break. If it’s any consolation, the first two losses were both by double-digits while the latest essentially came down to a late bucket by DeMar DeRozan. Still, Trae Young struggled in that one too with just 14 points on 17.6 percent shooting in the coverage of rookie Ayo Dosunmu.
On the season, the Hawks are actually outsourcing opponents by 0.7 points to lead the league in scoring with 28.8 points per game in the third quarter.
They also lead the league averaging 29.5 points in the second quarter.
But they are getting outscored in the fourth quarter by 1.7 points. Some of that is due to garbage time and the other team fighting feverishly to come back. But, for as bad as they’ve been in the third against Boston, they were outscored 25-20 in the fourth quarter too.
The 13 third-quarter points were their second-fewest behind only a nine-point fourth quarter against the Philadelphia 76ers back in December. They are 6-18 in games where they score fewer than 20 points in a quarter.
John Collins’ eventual return will certainly help.
Still, this team has issues that supersede personnel, and even their own potential, leading to seeing the consistent inconsistency that we have from them all season.