The Atlanta Hawks cruised to their second straight victory, Wednesday night in Orlando, as they pummeled the Magic, 130-109. This was the second game of a back-to-back set for Atlanta, after beating the Cleveland Cavaliers at home on Tuesday night. Atlanta closed out the first portion of their season with a two-game winning streak, and head into the All-Star break as the clear 10th seed of the Eastern Conference. They are 1.5 games ahead of the Washington Wizards and 2 games ahead of the New York Knicks.
Bogdan Bogdanovic kept up his hot play of late, and was the leading scorer for the Hawks at 23 points. He shot 9-of-13 from the field overall, and hit four of his six three-point attempts as well. Bogdanovic also finished with 6 assists on the night.
Since returning from injury in late-January, Bogdanovic has been playing great basketball for the Hawks and has accepted his current role coming off the bench for Atlanta. During this 12-game stretch, Bogdanovic is averaging 16.2ppg, 4.0apg, 4.1rpg, while shooting 47.1% from the field, and 42% from three. He is also averaging a +5.6 +/- rating. This play is reminiscent of Bogdanovic’s career-stretch last season, that helped Atlanta surge to a 27-11 record after Head Coach Nate McMillan took over the team.
Atlanta did a nice job in this game of making sure the Magic never had any hope. A big 37-point first quarter set the Hawks up for success, and they never looked back from there. Trae Young only had to play 25 minutes and finished with 22 points and 6 assists. Wednesday’s game wraps up the season series with the Orlando Magic. Atlanta will not see them again until next year, and they won this years’ series 3-1.
Atlanta does not play again until Friday, February 24th, when they head up to Chicago to take on the top-ranked Bulls. This will should be the first time that Atlanta gets to see Chicago with their full complement of players on tap. The two teams played a home-and-away set back in late-December, but Atlanta was ravaged by players being out in Covid protocols and injury. Chicago captured both games back in December. Atlanta also sees Chicago again on March 3rd, after that game was postponed back in January due to Covid protocols.
Besides Trae Young, who will be apart of multiple events for All-Star weekend, the team will use this time off to rest and get healthy for the late-season playoff push. Atlanta needs every win they can get if they want to crack a top-six seed in the East. It will not be easy, but it is possible, as seen with this group already.
