The Atlanta Hawks missed a golden opportunity to move into the ninth slot in the Eastern Conference, following their loss against the Dallas Mavericks Thursday night. The fatigue showed for Atlanta, with their third game in four nights, as they struggled to find their legs in the 109-95 loss.
Star player, Luka Doncic, who scored 70 points on the Hawks in their last meeting in Atlanta, struggled with foul trouble early in this one and even went scoreless in the first quarter. Doncic still finished with a double-double, and near triple-double, of 25 points, 12 rebounds and 8 assists. Kyrie Irving had a game-high 26 points on 10 of 21 shooting.
Neither team shot the ball well, with nearly identical splits. Atlanta shot an even-40% from the field overall and 34.2% from three, compared to 40.4% overall and 36.7% from Dallas. The largest discrepancy was at the free throw line, where Atlanta shot an anemic-66.7% and Dallas finished at 88.2%.
Jalen Johnson was coming off the heels of his first career triple-double, in Wednesday night’s victory over the Detroit Pistons, but struggled to follow-up that performance. Johnson struggled shooting the ball against the Mavs, going 3 of 12 from the field, for only 6 points. He did haul in 16 rebounds.
Bogdan Bogdanovic and Dejounte Murray also struggled from the field combining to go 12 of 32 from the field, 6 of 19 from three for 33 points.
The Hawks enter the final stretch of the season with only five games remaining. No one said it was going to be easy, with four of the five teams that they will play being locked into playoff or play-in spots at the minimum. In addition, three of their last five games are also on the road.
They get a day’s rest and will head to Denver to take on the defending-champions Saturday night. Tip-off for Saturday’s game is at 9:00 p.m. eastern from Denver’s Ball Arena.
