Jalen Johnson, Atlanta Hawks avoid New York sweep with roller coaster win over Knicks

Jalen Johnson, Atlanta Hawks avoid New York sweep with roller coaster win over Knicks

On today’s show the Hawks avoid the three-game sweep in New York by winning on this Tuesday over the New York Knicks at MSG a roller coaster to be sure in a game that was marred by injuries but in the end a victory for the Hawks on the

Road we’ll get into all of what transpired and more coming up you are locked on Hawks your daily Atlanta Hawks podcast part of the locked on podcast Network your team every Day Hello friends welcome to episode 1668 of the lot on Hawks podcast I am your host Brad Roland coming to you on a Tuesday evening into Wednesday here in early March and I want to encourage you as I always do on the podcast to make us your

First listen each and every day here at lockon Hawks please subscribe to the show anywhere you get your podcast that includes places like apple podcast and Spotify on the audio side as well as YouTube on the video side I should also plug that I did a two-part episode went

Up just a couple of days ago now with my friend Glenn Willis of ATL and 29 that’s a fun conversation always start to Glenn a little bit longer than usual to on part two of that but a fun Deep dive there to listen to um L of this

Beginning of this week and uh honestly we’ll focus most of this podcast even though there was a little bit of transactional news on Monday on what became a nice win for the Hawks 116 to 100 up in New York against the Knicks on this Tuesday evening it was basically

I would say marred by some injury stuff it was kind of the walking wounded coming in both teams banged up considerably and honestly I got a lot of feedback from people around the league that were kind of like man this not not a lot of luster in this one um famously

TNT pulled this game about a couple weeks ago and I think they’re probably are glad about that at this point in time but the Hawks don’t care about that nor should they and in the end they got this nice Road victory over the Knicks they stop the two game losing streak and

Of course avoided The Sweep of this bizarre six day trip to New York so um the Hawks LED this game by 22 points in the first half they they were up by 21 points with four minutes to go before halftime and then in kind of on brand

Fashion for this Hawks team they blew the entire lead in fact the game was tied multiple times late in the third quarter and then on the bright side the Hawks did close this game out very well in the fourth quarter a nice closing kick on the hole and the Knicks just

Couldn’t score for a while that was certainly beneficial to the Hawks and a comfortable is Win down the stretch although I’m not even sure if this final margin was indic it’s sometimes it was the Hawks were pretty good for most of this game and they were pretty brutal in

The middle of the game for a little while but in the end a nice victory that will break down in Deep dive fashion I mentioned that it was a walking wounded kind of situation on both sides of course Trey young remains out for the Hawks as does AA kongu so two of their

Top six or seven players of course including their best player Kobe buffkin was listed as questionable with left big toe storess in this game he was ruled out this afternoon obviously not going to change the projections a ton but obviously Hawks is looking forward to watching KOB as much as possible right

Now he couldn’t play in this game and then the Knicks didn’t have four of their top seven players including their best player in Jaylen Brunson their second best player in Julius Randall and I would probably argue their third best player Oobi all didn’t play in this game

Plus Mitchell Robinson who was about for a while but still essentially six of the top I don’t know 10 11 guys on these two teams didn’t play including all three guys that were Allstars this year that could have played that’s of course young Brun and Randall all were out so you

Know it was uh at least it was kind of even in fact our friends at fand Sportsbook made the Hawks only one point underdogs in this game despite being on the road and the Knicks are you know record-wise pretty good this year top five team in the East but they were so

Banged up and you know the Hawks are banged up for sure but they were actually the healthier team in this game and that kind of led to them being kind of a quot in this game and they were able to play well and of course win it

In the end so brly speaking we’ll start with the defense as far as the analysis is concern in this one they had a 105 defensive rating in this game and a lot of things happened at once on honestly number one the Hawks did play well I want to sayate that very plainly the

Hawks played well defensively in this game for the most part they had a good game plan I thought against a very limited opponent once it became clear that Brun was not going to play they don’t really have an offensive engine so the Knicks were going to be Reliant I it

Was pretty foreseeable but I think Quinn probably saw this as did the staff they were going to have basically be hoisting threes as their primary objective because you know the guys that they did have who I would describe as good offensive players divon chenzo Alec Burks boy MCD donovich are all kind of

Perimeter based players um you know harste is a pretty good player on sort of on the interior Josh hardt I like a lot but not not offensive engine miles MCB starting point guard is definitely a defend a Defender first so they didn’t really have anyone to pressure the rim

And the Hawks knew that and I think they were uh they knew that the Knicks were going to have to make threes to beat them number two though the Knicks didn’t make threes and that was very fortunate I thought in this game uh in the end the Knicks were 16 of

52 from three in the game that is massive volume and I’m sure that Quin Snider would undoubtedly say as he has many times this year that you do not want to give up that many three-point attempts um there’s sort of a debate a new school old school kind of debate

About like whether you want to take a lot of thees all that stuff I can tell you this Quint Sider is analytically friendly and I think that he would always say and has always said that you don’t want to allow a ton of at least open looks from three and the Knicks I

Got to say if you watch the game back it’s even more obvious got a lot of open looks in this game and missed them all not all of them obviously but um their two best Shooters You could argue at least two of their best shooters divon chenzo by the way is currently number

Three in the NBA in three-pointers this year um Curry I believe is number one but Dante is right behind him and he was uh I think he alone was five of 17 in this game Alec Burks was one of seven Off the Bench so the two of them

Combined to miss a lot of shots um only basically Josh Hart Who three of seven shot it well for the Knicks in this game but you know all that put in put into a kind of a stew of sorts and it was enough for the for the defense and

Without Brunson again New York’s different on on offense and honestly I’m pretty confident that the current the version that the Hawks saw of the Knicks tonight would be a pretty awful offensive team in the aggregate not only Brunson who is their best player on offense but even you know Randall I’m

Not the biggest Julius Randle guy I will admit that but he obviously carries a lot of usage for them etc etc but on the other side the Hawks did hold them to 47% from two-point range in the game that’s very good no matter who you’re playing against they allowed only 11

Free throw attempts in the game that’s also very good the Knicks 22 of 45 from inside of 14 ft so sub 50% on you know floaters and rim shots that’s very very good the Hawks were very good inside inside the play defensively I thought the bigs um capella and Bruno did pretty

Well on that they didn’t and I would say crucially they didn’t really respect anything that Knicks tried to do inside the arc which I think is that might sound crass but it’s not meant to be just what the Personnel that the Knicks had it was the right plan to basically

Not worry about that a ton um there there were some still some problems they didn’t force a lot of Turners in this game only 12 they allowed 25 fast break points that’s obviously quite bad they allowed 17 offensive rebounds that’s not great either but the overall package on

Defense worked even if they were definitely fortunate with the shooting like I I don’t think that the Hawks played well enough to sort of quote unquote deserve a 105 defensive rating in this game but they did play well enough and there was at least a plan

There you you can kind of see um offensively they were kind of a similar story in some ways but I will say was a22 offensive rating that was uh easily the best they’ve been since Trey young went down broadly speaking they were very good in the first quarter and the

Fourth quarter in the middle it was pretty rough on offense but the entire package was enough for the win the biggest swing in Atlanta’s favor was the inside the arc shooting as I mentioned before the Knicks were really bad inside the arc the Hawks shot 61% on twos in

This game including 12 of 14 from two in the fourth quarter so they were the more physical team also sort of the way the Knicks played it in this game they played a lot of their small guys a lot of minutes the Hawks were the bigger

Team which is going to sound funny if you’re a Die Hard Hawks fan watching this team all year long the Hawks have had some size questions and some size problems all year long but the Hawks I believe played every minute of this game with a center on the court that was not

Jaylen Johnson so they’ve been they actually played a true Center the whole game which means Jaylen played 38 minutes at the four and then Bay played 36 minutes the Hawks were the bigger team which is not often the case but they were and they kind of played like

It which I think was a good idea they sh well from three they were 10 31 that was actually still better than the Knicks were although they made six fewer threes than the Knicks did they took they took a lot fewer and I will say uh a theme

That I talked about a little bit with Glenn and also on the show previous to that the Hawks are not creating threes right now which I think Quinn acknowledges is not a great thing you know part of that’s Trey if not all of that is just not having Trey to create

Those shots but that’s uh more of a future facing concern than a present one tonight the Hawks also did also had more turnovers 16 than offensive rebounds 13 but they did turn those rebounds into to 19 Second Chance wi which was actually a very good ratio so um it was mostly the

Work of guys like capella you know B had four as well they did a good job converting those if nothing else and they also took about double the free throw attempts that the Knicks did um the Knick one they took I think was yeah 11 in the game that’s really low so the

Hawks actually only were about League average in creating free throws in this game but they took a lot more and that obviously matters a lot we’ll come back to it later on in the podcast we talk about the individual player stuff in this one but four guys had 17 points or

More I thought Jaylen Johnson was pretty comfortably the best player on the floor on either team in this game and honestly I think DeAndre Hunter might have been second he played a lot fewer minutes so if you want to go per minute I think he was certainly number two on the list of

Guys who performed really well in this game but Jaylen was awesome we talk about that later same with Hunter and that was huge also thought the Hawks got really helpful stuff off the bench from like Trent Forest who is not supposed to be playing right now but Kobe buffkin

Was unable to play and Trent was plus 14 in 11 minutes he made both of his shots he had four assists no turnovers good defense like he was very good in this game and uh yeah all the way around like on one hand I would say that only a

Couple guys played like super well compared to the normal Baseline but most guys were like around what they normally do sad Bay was fine in this game click capella had some nice moments was fine in this game uh bogey struggled for sure um and we’ll get into this later on

Bruno had somehow seven turnovers in this game that’s crazy but uh Garis ma was fine in this game you know anyway up and down the roster it was enough and uh in the end it was it was an ugly game I have to say like if you were a neutral

Party in this game watching it without without a rooting interest I’m sure you would have been uh rubbing your eyes on occasion but um part of that you know you’re facing your shorted opponent but part of that is you know those two guys are very basically Jaylen and Hunter

Were really good and Murray was really good in the fourth quarter and uh it’s a nice win no question about it I’m sure the Hawks uh you know wanted to avoid losing all three games on this New York trip and as we look ahead later on in the podcast Al play again literally

Tomorrow or as you probably listen to this podcast tonight against the Cavs so that’s a tough game in a lot of ways so U avoiding a loss here against a kind of you know underman opponent um is certainly a nice thing to kind of end

This J New York on and we’ll talk talk more about this game kind of how it unfolded in a second there are plenty of details to sort of unlock in this game and at the end of the podcast by the way if you’re new list what we do is kind of

Talk about all the different players and how they performed in this one for Atlanta but before all that stuff arrives work from our partners on today’s podcast Today’s Show is brought to you by eBay motors and passion driv imp patience or what bring home the winning Trophy and it’s also what keeps your

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One more time the place to go is ebaymotors.com eBay guaranteed fit is only available to us customers eligible items only exclusions apply all right and to the game Flow in this one it was a very sloppy start that was certainly kind of befitting of the you know short-handed nature of these

Two teams and kind of what was a pretty game on the whole uh except for Jaylen Johnson so Jaylen made three of his first four shots and had the first six points of the game for either team everyone else in that span on the Hawks or the Knicks combined to miss the first

12 shots so Jaylen was three or four the rest of both teams 0 of 12 pretty indicative what was to come in a lot of ways uh ironically the first person to make a field goal other than Jaylen was Clint capella and that happened after

Four full minutes of game time so in the first four minutes one F sorry no one had a field goal than Jaylen pretty crazy the Knicks stayed incredibly cold in that first quarter which honestly in the end kind of proved to be pivotal the Hawks were able to hold the Knicks down

So much in that first quarter they had basically I I talked about this a little bit early on but essentially New York starting lineup in this game had only one guy I would describe as above average on offense and that’s Divan chenzo um they had some good Defenders

Press Chu is a good Defender miles’s a great defender at the point of attack Josh Hart I love but not great offensive players that kind of uh very much showed once the Knicks kind of played there bench guys they were a little bit better on offense that they were worse on

Defense so there you go um the Hawks had a nice a nice run mid quarter 80 to go up by 14 they made seven out of eight shots in that stretch and then uh you know rotation wise no huge surprises here with Kobe out of the lineup and

Again it’s a big toe issue for Kobe hopefully only a One Gamer we’ll see if he’s able a able able to play I should say on Wednesday but it was Hunter Fernando Garrison Matthews is the first three subs and then Trent Forest got the backup point guard minutes I believe I’m

Checking this again now yes Trent played only with the jonte off the court which is not a huge surprise that’s kind of the way it probably should be um you know Forest played well I thought that was for sure also they wisely I thought tried to have both Jaylen and bogie on

The court with Trent because Forest is not like a super an offensive initiator so you want to give him some more support and Jaylen and bogie are the two guys to go ahead and do that um Quinn had a nice atto play that he designed

For Bruno Fernando on a late dunk in the first quarter and essentially the shooting disparity that happened the entire game was even more so in that first quarter the Hawks had their season best 15 points allow it was actually 18 and then the Knicks had a shot waved off

During the quarter break that ended up being uh not counting so um Jay had 11 points in that first quarter the Knicks only had 15 so it was uh pretty lopsided by the way de chenzo was one of nine from three in the first quarter he took

Nine by himself in the quarter um the then scored twice in a row to start second quarter and went by 22 points actually couple nice play by by Forest did a nice lob and on a drive to jayen Johnson and then a nice sort of drive

For a push shot off the glass Hunter was red hot too he made six of his first eight shots at 14 points in the first 10 minutes the Hawks were up very comfortably in that stretch and we’re up by 21 points with four minutes to go in

The first half but then the Knicks kind of came alive a 13-2 run at the outset they scored five times in a row and the lead was down to 10 Jaylen then did score five straight points in the middle of the quarter to kind of stabilize

Things a little bit but then um Hawks only up by 11 at halftime despite kind of being in control which I kind of flagged as being kind of concerning cuz the Knicks were not making shots and it was like all right this game is probably a little bit closer than it probably

Should be but offensively it was really good in the first half Jaylen and Hunter had 31 points combined on Elite efficiency nothing else special but certainly that was a big part of it and then the second half was again kind of all over the place uh the Knicks you

Know it was kind of a couple of runs back and forth the Hawks were sto by 15ish points in the middle of the quarter Jaylen had 22 in the middle by the middle of the third it was you know he had a couple big shots but then after

He made a big three mid Quarter New York had their biggest run of the game 15 to one to go from the Hawks up 14 to a tie game late in the third Bruno I love Bruno everyone does he had three turnovers and 40 seconds in that run

Granted two of those were offensive fouls and at least one of those was probably more on the point guard which was Murray at the time than it was than Bruno but it was still a tough stretch for Bruno in a let away through the wall away Quinn then challenged a play on

Bruno he was called for a foul I didn’t love that call on the floor but it was not going to be a challenge win that was a bad challenge I think it might have been that Quinn was trying to just stabilize a little bit like stop the

Bleeding because it was a getting away from the Hawks a little bit at that point in time but uh a low percentage challenge that he ended up losing the Hawks only had one point in about five minutes in that run and the lead essentially went from 21 to zero in

About 15 minutes of game time so it was a pretty big downturn for Atlanta ironically it was Trent Forest who’s probably the guy you would guess would be the least likely to score break the drought he broke the drought and then bogie actually made his only shot of the

Game late in the third that was a big one I thought to kind of avoid some of the downturn for Atlanta but the offense was awful in that third quarter no no way there were five turnovers in the third seven of 22 shooting bad process bad results bad bad bad but they were

Able to kind of overcome that honestly I I’ll stop here and say this now a lot of times this year the Hawks might have lost this game like they’ve kind of rolled over a few times and yes it’s hard in the NBA um to come back from

Down 21 so the Knicks probably had to use a lot of energy all that stuff and it kind of tilts sometimes back to the home team sorry back to the team that was winning in the first place but the Hawks could have rolled over and they

Didn’t so that was actually a a hat tip to them they were able to be sort of mentally tough enough to to kind of fight back and not have that beat them because they actually never lost the lead it was tied twice I believe in the

Third quarter but um they were up it was never comfortable comfortable there was by the way the Knicks missed six threes in a row to begin the fourth quarter that was also very helpful going back to what I said before about the shooting there was some favors done by the Knicks

But uh the play of the night probably was the was the DeAndre Hunter drive on the left Baseline for a dunk um really aggressive and a great finish like I thought Hunter was really good in this game that was a uh non Hunter like play

Love to see that um but the lead though was still only down to four with six and a half minutes to go so that was the closest it got in the fourth quarter but it was a little bit dicey but then Murray hit a big three he was much

Better in the fourth quarter I thought than he was in the first three and then capella scored five points in a row for Atlanta kind of sne three freee throws out of four which is pretty solid for Clint and then a a nice finish on a on a putback so the Hawks

Are up by nine with the ball three minutes to go it was kind of like you’re in a pretty dominant position there it’s not automatic but you should win at that point and then from there they got a couple nice Shots by I think there’s one

By Hunter off of a nice timeout play that Quinn set up for capella to hand off to Hunter downhill that worked out very well Murray hit another jump another jumper Bay scored and it was basically over the Knicks scored three points in about five and a half minutes

In that stretch so was it pretty it was not um but in the end it doesn’t need to be pretty I mean that’s kind of the NBA it’s it’s a long season you never want to overreact to one game two games three games four games whatever I always

Preach that and I’ll say it again here but the Hawks kind of won a game that could have gotten away from them that’s kind of the nice way to put it in this game um they did get big time efforts from Jaylen and DeAndre which we talk

About more in a second and they kind of avoided disaster um but really they played two excellent quarters and then two not very good quarters but that was enough um with the help of some bad shooting and the Hawks kind of finishing around the room at a higher

Level than Nicks did so they escape there and we’ll talk more about the player stuff in a moment as well by the way as the signing of Dylan Windler which took place on Monday to a 2A contract I’ll talk about that in more in just one moment but first and we from

Our partners on the podcast Today’s Show is brought to you by better help sometimes we need the opportunity to get something off of our chest big or small certain things can actually start to get to you if you you let them it’s part to let the stuff out

Especially to someone who happens to be unbiased on your life today I want to tell you about how I feel about something and for maybe a few of you in a similar space you might happen to understand that and that’s that have some unease about the next steps in the

Media industry right now I talk about what’s report around the Hawks although that’s interesting of course but what more more so whether there actually going to be jobs people like me in the media industry whether the work that I do in different ways will actually be

Able to continue how it is now layoffs all that stuff and of course not the most intense or life altering topic for some people the therapy can also be different for everybody most of us including me have bigger problems than stuff involving Sports and media Etc but

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MBA get 10% off your first month of betterhelp that’s betterhelp.com loton MBA one more time the website to go to is betterhelp that’s betterhelp.com lockon MBA all right and before I dive into the player stuff from this game on Tuesday the Hawks did make some transactional

News on Monday so the Hawks waited till the final day they were allowed to sign a 2A contract but they finally did it in the form of signing Dylan Windler by the way they de they created that space by waving Patty Mills and convering Trent forest and while I’m here Patty Mills

Signed with the heat today so he’s back in the league but as of d as for Dylan Winer 67 Wing first round pick of the Cavs back in 2019 he’s actually 27 years old now so a very old two-way player he’s the same age as as Deonte Murray

And Garrison Matthews just for a reference point there he’s older than de audre Hunter etc etc but he definitely has some Talent he can shoot it makes decisions well with the ball in his hands and is a very good rebounder for a wing in particular personally I think

He’s more of a three but he can play a little bit of four he played some there in the g- league he probably kind of small for that but not comically so he won’t get killed there because the rebounding especially but he really is like kind of wing sized not a huge

Athlete um also he’s only eligible to be active in uh he’s actually active tonight so 11 more games it’s parade basically but just like it was with Trent Forest there’s a cap on how much you can be active I think the Hawks are hoping by the end of the year they’ll

Have some of the g- league guys back maybe a Kong wo etc etc but a lot of people ask by the way like kind of why the Hawks didn’t sign a center and uh number one I don’t know the answer um I’ve talked about this a lot last couple

Weeks and I’ve noted that they probably just need some front Court depth I have said on the show previously it didn’t have to be a center it would prefer to be a center in my opinion but it didn’t have to be because they are comfortable playing jayen Johnson at Center when

They need to do that like tonight they didn’t play jayen at Center at all but Pro one of the problems with playing jayen Center is a lack of forward depth so I’ve said that a lot on the show recently as well it makes it hard to play jayen at Center because you only

Really have two other forwards so you have one lineup where you can play three guys that are forward size you have Hunter you have ba and you have Johnson you have Wes Matthews but he’s six fiveish and and also some they play a lot of minutes I’m not I don’t think

Wi’s going to play a lot no matter who they signed in the twoa contract I said this last week as well I’ll say it again now no matter who they signed that guy was not going to be suddenly in line to play a lot unless there were multiple

Injuries in front of him but it’s just a depth thing it’s more of a functional depth thing I think they might they obviously like d Windler in terms of what he could be or or they wouldn’t have signed him but you know it is what it is it doesn’t solve the problem as

Far as size and depth is concerned but he gives them more size and rebounding someone like Garrison Matthews would in a pinch if they were to lose Clint or lose br and had to play Jaylen at Center a lot they could use Windler more as a you know potential small ball four

Option with some rebounding Etc than they could some of the other guys they have on the roster so um in the end it’s a two-way contract for a guy who’s been around a little while first round pick but he struggled to stay healthy at times has not established himself in the

League just yet he was on a two-way this year with the Lakers he’s played some with the Cavs and with the Knicks in the past so it’s not like he’s going to change this season a lot for the Hawks but he does have some NBA level skills

For sure and the or I think it’s just betting on Talent at this point in time and look you know it’s it’s late in the year they were not going to like they weren’t likely to make a huge Splash as far as a 2A signing could they have

Signed miles Norris they could have I think they probably that was an option that was available to them they didn’t do that so they obviously preferred this method um I don’t think it matters a ton in fact I would like to take a poll of hawks fans that even remember the name

Of Donovan Williams who they who was on a two-way contract within the last two years with the Hawks who they signed late in the year and he basically just never appeared and that might happen to wiler too so we’ll see but um you know low impact I would have criticized them

Heavily if they had not signed anyone because that would have made no sense at all but you know in the end it’s kind of a shrug and um hopefully they can unlock something there but he is 27 so it’s more it’s you know I would say that

There’s like two two different kinds of two-ways it’s more of the long-term development guy and then there’s kind of the plug andplay guy when there’s more of the plug-and play but maybe uh with a smidge of long-term stuff if they can get them healthy and the shooting plays

Up but anyway not a huge impact thing which why I’m saving till now but there you go um anyway to the actual game player evaluations on this Tuesday U like I said before not not not a ton of guys played incredibly well but it was good enough um Off the Bench I will

Start positive Trent forest was really good in this game um I think some people missed that Kobe was not Kobe was not available to play in this game and I got some angry replies for talking about Trent um number one Kobe was just unavailable to play if they had played

Trent over Kobe I would not like that either I’ve said before like Kobe he needs to play every game Etc um but Trent did play well in this game 11 minutes they were plus 14 in those minutes um that’s pretty impressive uh Five Points four assists no turnovers

May both Str from the field good Defender so you know as far as the TR Force experience is concerned it’s about as good as it could have gone there’s that um Garrison was kind of a non-factor three points all free throws three rebounds he was fine but nothing uh to write home about

Bruno had a couple of high highs actually had one really big dunk and had one really huge block so some nice highlights I’m talking about that positively because because he also had seven turnovers in 23 minutes that is impossible now I think three at least it might have been four were offensive

Fouls and they do count as turnovers so those are uh moving screens there at least two or three of those you know not great uh Bruno had some issues getting fouls at times in the past also had a couple of passes that were terrible so it was truly highs and lows with Bruno

Um he’ll he’ll be better than this but uh it was he was he was a negative I thought overall even with the pop plays but it happens um the other Hunter though was awesome Off the Bench 22 points in 25 minutes he was seven of

Nine on twos and two of five on threes in the 10 previous games coming in he was shooting 53% from the field and 50% from three um and that kind of stayed in that range right now today so I think he’s like around 70% true shooting for

Like the last three weeks or so that’s not sustainable but hunter is playing very well he’s getting into the rim he’s been he’s being much more aggressive um he looks healthy which is good they’re not playing a ton of minutes but that’s fine with me so uh yeah on the also also

He closed the game which was the right call I thought he was better than bogy just flat out in this game so um yeah very positive stretch from from Hunter I’d recommend not getting too crazy you know this is year five but he has had some injury stuff so knock on wood again

You hope that he’s you hope he’s healthy number one and effective number two because he is a guy on this roster that can kind of do stuff that most guys can’t do on this roster you know jaylen’s kind of a different tier of course than Hunter is but beyond Jaylen

Like Hunter being a 68 two-way Wing is very helpful that can kind of keep keep him on the floor keep him engaged and playing well um to the starters in this one um bogy was the worst of the starters it’s crazy though I’ll say this uh I’ve made this point before even when

Bogi plays poorly the Hawks tend to do well in his minutes because you know he has by far by the way the best onoff splits on the team this year coming into today um the Hawks had like a plus two or three rating with him on the court

For the year I think they were like minus looking at this now they were minus8 with him off the court so like bogie has huge plus minus splits that happened again tonight he was plus 19 in a game they won by 16 uh he wasn’t good

In the game uh I think it was probably his worst three- game stretch of the Season overall uh he’s nine of 32 from the field the last three games um the Hawks not listenting him on the injury report but it’s kind of common knowledge right now around the team that he’s

Something is happening with bogy’s right hand um I think it was Jam Johnson I I couldn’t quite tell who it was I think it was jamaa asked Quinn about that he didn’t really give an give an answer to that postgame but um I’m not sure how much of effective that actually is but

Certainly it’s a shooting hand he’s not shooting well we’ll see but part of that maybe not having Trey because that affects everybody on offense but um regardless Bogie’s not playing well right now so hope they get him going in the near future but outside of that

Everybody else was fine uh capella had a nice closing stretch in the fourth quarter 13 points nine rebounds three assists and a block for Clint he uh finished better as the game went along I think he missed his first three shots maybe first four shots and then he was

Five of six or seven after that so he was better than that after he crucially had five points in a row in the fourth quarter so not his best self still working himself back into shape um back into you know Health all that stuff but I thought he was uh showing better signs

As the game went along sadik wasn’t efficient 17 points and 17 shots but was fine otherwise nine rebounds two assists a steal a block played physically gave them just okay production across the board was fine like a you know B minus kind of game for C which is fine all you

Need and then uh Murray weird one like I think that he did not play well for about three quarters in this game he wasn’t just like horrible but certainly not his best work and then you look up he makes a couple of shots in the fourth quarter certainly which I mentioned

Before couple of big jumpers the one three they put them up by seven was a massive shot a couple more putting the game away he was better in the fourth quarter ends up a 219 and six I’m not sure that’s like indicative of how good

He was and the Hawks only wor plus two in his minutes compared to compared to Trent um but and he wasn’t super efficient but still I thought Murray was by the end was fine um you know I would have thought if the Hawks won this game

By this margin he would have been better but that’s a credit to Jaylen and a credit to DeAndre um so there you go and also they I will say this the Knicks loaded up to Murray a lot they definitely threw the kitchen sck at him not quite the try treatment but miles

Bride is an excellent Defender and he was on Murray the entire game so a tough sledding there for him and a win is a win is a win and then lastly jayon Johnson was excellent man I mean he was the best player on the court I said it

Once before I’ll say it again now he was awesome in this game he wasn’t quite as dominant offensively down the stretch I think he had 22 points mid third quarter ended up with 26 but was plus 23 in the game that’s a game best and that was indicative how he played um nine

Rebounds seven assists um he actually had the second most points he’s had all year with 26 and the second most assisted all year was seven plus the rebounding he was 10 of 14 on twos two of three from three no free throw TS but that was CU he was just finishing

Everything anyway so I thought Jaylen you know the passing was really good defensively a little bit overeager a couple times but I thought he was fine defensively and like you know obviously Hawks fans don’t need to be told this but you the future is incredibly bright

He’s already playing very well I I think slh hope and look I called this out preseason so hopefully I’m right in the end but I thought Jaylen was a real most improved candidate preseason and I think with every passing day I don’t really know why he’s not talked about in the

Top two or three of that award race right now um even in the Benny markets Etc FanDuel if there’s still odds there I think he’s still a real candidate for it we’ll see but uh he’s been playing great basketball in recent days and certainly was the best player on the

Court tonight so they don’t win the game without jail I’m conf I’m confident to say that even they won this game by a pretty Comfort Maj in the end if he didn’t play they don’t win it I don’t think so that’s pretty uh pretty High Praise in itself all right that’s all I

Have on the player side in this one in the end a really nice win I mean yes the kns were short-handed no question about that but it’s still a road win at MSG avoiding the three- game losing streak and in advance of it game on Wednesday

It’s going to be a pretty tough one in some respects so you didn’t want to have this one go the wrong way I know there’s the constant uh back and forth between people that want the Hawks to tank or lose every game or the people that want

Them to make the play in I’m not weighing on that I’m just giving you the analysis of the game itself the Hawks want to win they’re playing to win that’s very obvious and they won the game so there you go um from here I said it before but the Hawks play again on

Wednesday back at home a very quick turnaround it’s back toback for both teams actually the Cavs played tonight as well so you know all things equal travel-wise it might even be Advantage Hawks slightly because they’re going they’re coming home and uh much like the game tonight Wednesday’s game will be a

Battle between wounded teams so the Hawks still will be without Trey and Ona but the Cavs one have Diamond Mitchell who is their best is their best player he’s already ruled out Max stru did not play tonight and he’s you know he’s one of their better wings um he didn’t play

Tonight we’ll see about him playing tomorrow but um yeah we’ll see how that all looks looks I’m looking as we speak to make sure I have the best number to give you right away yeah our friends at FanDuel make the Hawks actually like a one-point favorite at this moment again

They already know that Mitchell is out um so we’ll see another coin flip game basically all these games have been coin flips the two games in New York sorry two games in Brooklyn the Hawks were like tiny underdogs they lost both tonight they were tiny Underdog again

They won it there might be a tiny favorite on on Wednesday but it’s essentially a bunch of 50% kind of games and they’ve won one of them out of the three and we’ll see they can make it two out of the four on Wednesday but we’ll

Have a full breakdown of that game after it is over on Wednesday evening and uh with that I will plug a few things before we get out of here um one thing is we have um after most games a bonus episode of sorts on our Audio Only feeds

From the folks at locked on Sports Atlanta that that only goes in the audio only platforms they have their own YouTube channel but if you are looking for some extra listening just B of stuff no less for me by any means but that’ll be labeled as the postcast in our Audio

Only platform so if you see that uh don’t be surprised that’s just some extra content coming from theot lockon Sports Atlanta crew also you can subscribe rate and review this podcast across podcast platforms Apple Spotify pocketcast castbox overcast all those places um Amazon music has a has has all

The Lo podcast Network as well so you can find us on all those platforms as well as on YouTube and it would do a huge favor for me if you were to subscribe and Auto download the podcast across platforms even multiple times audio video Etc the best way to support

The show is to click around download on a regular basis and I very much appreciate that also follow the show on Twitter SLX Lon Hawks follow me there as well at BTR Rolland and I write about the Hawks on a regular basis at patreon.com BTR Rolland if you want to

Check out that I’d be appreciative of that as well all right I will be done rambling on this Tuesday I’ll have a podcast about 24 hours from now breaking down Hawks Cavs on Wednesday and until then we’ll see you next time

Brad Rowland (@BTRowland, DIME on UPROXX) hosts episode No. 1668 of the Locked on Hawks podcast. The show breaks down Tuesday’s game between the Atlanta Hawks and the New York Knicks, including big nights from Jalen Johnson and De’Andre Hunter, a strong start, a big-time wobble in the third quarter, a strong closing kick, shorthanded rosters on both sides, the Dylan Windler signing, and much more.

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