Coming off a blow-out victory over the Toronto Raptors Saturday night, things were looking up for the Atlanta Hawks. Tuesday night’s game against the Boston Celtics was an important Eastern Conference match-up. Atlanta jumped out to a 17-point lead in the first half and it looked like the team was picking up where they left off. Unfortunately, the Hawks played maybe the worst half of basketball, maybe of any team this season, scoring only 33 points total in the third and fourth periods. Atlanta suffered what might have been their most disappointing loss of the season, as the Boston Celtics rallied back to win 107-98.
After leading for almost the entirety of the first half, and an injury that saw Celtics star, Jaylen Brown (ankle), leave the game, the Hawks inability to make three point shots ultimately led to their downfall. They shot a dismal 7-of-31 from beyond the arc.
The Atlanta Hawks have been unable to find any identity or sense of coherency throughout this season, and the spotlight was bright on Hawks forward, De’Andre Hunter Tuesday night. Hunter had undoubtedly his worst performance of the season, and perhaps his career, finishing with only 4 points on 0-of-8 shooting from the field.
After a trade that saw former Hawk, Cam Reddish, shipped to the New York Knicks earlier this season, many viewed this as Atlanta “choosing” between either Hunter or Reddish. While Reddish’s playing time in New York has been sporadic at best, Hunter’s offensive performances since then have been nothing short of disappointing. Since that trade, Hunter has averaged just 13.9 points per game on an lowly 39% from the field and an eye-popping 33% from outside the arc. Hawks fans had high hopes for Hunter, who was at one point the team’s second-leading scorer in the first half of last season before going down with injury.
Perhaps the worst news to come from this game was Trae Young tweaking his ankle. Young had a 22-point first half, but landed on the foot of Celtics guard, Marcus Smart, as he contested a three-pointer from Young. Young did finish the game, but was noticeably hobbled in the second half, and finished with 31 points on the night. Every Hawks fan held their breathe at this juncture of the game. With John Collins still out for the foreseeable future, even a short-term loss of Young could result in Atlanta completely missing the play-in tournament.
Bogdan Bogdanovic, who finished the game with 25 points, summed up the feeling both fans and players have on the current state of the organization.
“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,” said Bogdanovic with his postgame comments.
Atlanta will need to reset and refocus as they play the Chicago Bulls Thursday at home and for the second time in a week. Atlanta fell to the Bulls last week on a DeMar DeRozan go-ahead jumper in the final moments of that game. This was actually a rescheduled matchup after the original date was postponed back in January due to Covid protocols. Atlanta will look to rebound at State Farm Arena in what should be a great match-up. Tip-off for this game is at 7:00 p.m. eastern.
