The Atlanta Hawks have not had a season that they would like to remember. While they did have a good enough end to the season where they managed to qualify for the playoffs through the play-in tournament. Unfortunately for the Hawks they suffered a play-in hangover in the first game against the Heat but expect them to bounce back in Game 2.
The NBA also announced their finalists for six awards on the same day that the Hawks opened their playoffs. These categories were Coach of the Year, Defensive Player of the Year, Most Improved Player, MVP, Rookie of the Year, and Sixth Man of the Year.
Looking firstly at the awards that the Hawks had no chance of winning. Thanks to them bringing back a similar roster from last seaosn, they were never going to win Most Improved. The Hawks are also going to need to change their attitude to playing rookies if they are going to have a chance at Rookie of the Year.
The Atlanta Hawks had a glimmer of a chance on some awards
While Trae Young had an All-NBA type season, he was never really in the running for MVP. He led the NBA in points and assists which had not been done since Tiny Archibald did it in the early 1970’s. However, the season that the Hawks had counted Young out from the award.
Nate McMillan did his best with the squad he had all year. He was not able to repeat the success of last season and was never going to be in the running. Given his up and down season, Clint Capela was also never going to be in the running for Defensive Player of the Year.
The only award that the Hawks could have hoped for would have been Sixth Man of the Year. They had two players win the Sixth Man of the Month award, Danilo Gallinari once early in the season and Bogdan Bogdanovic who won it for both February and March.
Unfortunately for the Hawks, both of these players did not have the season’s required which helped their team to a direct playoff qualification. They both played really well but were not in the same league as Tyler Herro, Cam Johnson or Kevin Love.
The Hawks are going to have to put together a full season if they have any hope of making more noise in the awards for next season. They can only hope to get some silverware from the playoffs to make this season worthwhile.