Atlanta Hawks brush off ‘tired legs’ excuse after blowout loss to MIA

This certainly was not how the Atlanta Hawks wanted to begin their postseason – with a 115-91 loss to the top-seeded Miami Heat. They are fresh off of a spirited win over the Cleveland Cavaliers on Friday and were met by an even more spirited Heat squad. Rather than pin the blame on the quick turnaround, though, they cited their opponent’s fire.

Miami came out with a clear and effective plan to stop Trae Young. They were physical with him from the outset which, regardless of it often pushing the limits of legal, set a tone for the entire game.

Young finished with just eight points on 1-for-12 shooting including going 0-for-7 from beyond the arc.

He didn’t just struggle from the floor, though, and it was all by design.

Hopefully, Game 1 was the Atlanta Hawks bottoming out versus MIA

Heat guard Jimmy Butler finished with 21 points on 60.0% shooting with six rebounds, four assists, and three steals. He also guarded Young a lot and said the Hawks point guard “missed a lot of shots that he normally makes”, but noted that that was the goal in keeping him in front of them.

“He is constantly breaking down defenses and causing you to help. And if you don’t help, it’s a layup. It’s a floater. And if you do help, he’s hitting the right guy every single time. I think we did a great job of not fouling and just moving our feet and staying in front.”

Butler’s point about Miami not fouling is nuanced. While they did do a good job of keeping him out of the lane – just three of his 12 attempts came in the paint – that doesn’t mean they did not foul.

Kyle Lowry sent an elbow to Young’s chops at one point and then slid into his legs going after a loose ball. A fairly egregious downward swat to Young’s face from Heat sixth-man Tyler Herro also went uncalled.

All of this after Butler tried intimidating him in the first quarter somehow resulted in double technical fouls being issued.

Still, the Hawks weren’t making excuses for their quick turnaround.

“You can definitely feel the heavy legs, but you’ve got to give them credit. They came out aggressive.” said Young during his postgame presser following the lowest-scoring playoff game and just the 17th time in his career he’s been held below 10 points.

His head coach also predictably had no interest in letting tired legs be an excuse for his team’s poor performance during his media availability, adding that Miami showed them what it takes.

“I don’t think it’s tired legs. I think Miami played at another level. We talked about that in our locker room. That, in the playoffs, there’s another level that you have to get to. They already play with a high-intensity, aggressiveness every possession. And they showed us, tonight, that there’s another level that we have to get to in order to compete.”

Danilo Gallinari was direct in his postgame assessment.

“They played with way more intensity than we did. And we were not ready. They started from the beginning of the game and we never matched it throughout the whole game…we play back-to-backs the whole season. We play a lot of games. We cannot be an excuse team. Again, just got to be ready to play basketball.”

Gallo – who was a bright spot with 17 points and five rebounds – went on to talk about the Hawks needing to play with more intensity the next time out.

The Hawks were without Clint Capela who hyperextended his knee after pulling Cleveland Cavaliers big man Evan Mobley down causing the latter the roll into him. John Collins made his return off of the bench to play surprisingly well with 10 points on 66.7% shooting.

He also had four rebounds in his 21-plus minutes of action but the Hawks were largely flat offensively.

Bogdan Bogdanovic has been a veritable star for the Hawks down the stretch, particularly in the fourth quarter. But he went 0-for-8 from the floor including 0-for-4 from deep getting all six of his points at the free-throw line to go with three boards and two assists.

The Hawks will try to regroup and come back ready for Tuesday’s 7:30 PM ET Game 2.

Until then, they had better take the example shown by the Heat to heart or their stay in the postseason will be a short one.