#SquadGoals (Premature Offseason Edition)
This series ain’t a series until somebody wins a game on the road. For the Atlanta Hawks and their fans, they’re hoping there won’t be a series until after Game 5 or Game 7. If so, that means the Hawks took care of business here at The Highlight Factory, beginning today against those oh-so-offended Washington Wizards (5:30 PM Eastern, Fox Sports Southeast and 92.9 FM in ATL; CSN Mid-Atlantic in DC; TNT if you can stomach it).
The True To Atlanta bill has come due. A regular season flavored with banging hip hop concerts, boisterous “ATL” chants, playground remodels, community outreach events, Tinder Nights, all that stuff were mere appetizers setting up the main course, to be served to us fans by our boys in Torch Red. No one is here to watch the Hawks lay down like they did on way too many occasions this season at Philips Arena. But to be True To ATL and pull off a pair of resounding victories at Philips Arena over the next few days, these Hawks have to show they can be true to one another.
You’d be hard-pressed to find, in the history of American sports consciousness, a time when an Atlanta team or player was granted the upper hand in a national media-fueled war of words. Whether it’s all this talmbout “MMA”, or the suggestion that the Wizards played the best ball of their natural lives (they hadn’t) yet could only win by single digits, or that our small-ball lineups are clearly superior (it’s not), virtually everything is bulletin board material for the pearl clutchers from the District of Columbia.
Every unnecessary utterance of self-praise, or of silver linings, by the Hawks has been served up like a T-ball and hit out the park by the Wizards. So, please, don’t nobody remind them of this Instagram post, back when Dennis Schröder was trying to make nice with Dwight Howard, in the aftermath of I-Thought-You-Had-Steph-Gate.
“We the best DUO in the Pick & Roll !!! Nobody can stop us .. when we both play on the highest level !!!” The best duo, Dennis? O rly? Well, John Wall and his furrowed brow would like to have a word with… whoa, whoa, careful with all that gang signage there, Johnny! You wouldn’t want to re-injure your precious wrist, right?
This is not merely about the former #1 pick in the league getting his gander up about every perceived slight. Wall has built up his rep over seven seasons as the fastest point guard, the most athletic point guard, the best-passing point guard, and now, the highest-scoring point guard in the East… who hasn’t won jack.
Despite fits and starts, the four-time All-Star has guided his franchise to its best season in over a generation, and the teams seeded above Washington in the playoffs are looking quite shaky. He’s had to wait for LeBron to sail out of South Beach, and for whatever that was Atlanta was doing in 2015, before his Wizards could lay claim to being the class of the Southeast Division.
After years of disrespect and disappointment, the path to the NBA Finals and global acclaim is finally Wall’s to blaze. And yet… who is THIS kid, standing in the way of his manifest destiny?
Established contemporaries like Kemba Walker, Jeff Teague, or Goran Dragic were one thing. But this… this… BOY (pronounced “BWOAHH”, in Raleigh-speak)? This “ute” over here, with the poor-man’s Kwame hairdo? This youngster, three inches smaller, 25 pounds lighter, three years his junior, is Wall’s biggest threat to staking his claim? Oh, no, this shall not stand!
Fortunately, Schröder has no designs on just going and sitting down somewhere. He remembers last year, when the 4-seed Hawks won its first two opening-round games at home, and things seemed dire for the 5-seed at the time. Then the series shifted to Boston, and by the time Game 4 came to an overtime close, the Celtics had evened the series, and fans and media alike were crafting love ballads for small-wonder Isaiah Thomas. Schröder could benefit from a little of that action, and a pair of upstaging wins could do the trick.
Nevermind that the next Boston playoff victory didn’t come until last night. From the looks of things, you’d have thought the Celtics won that series. Just like, if you queried the average fan, Paul Pierce’s Wizards “won” that conference semifinal series against the Hawks in 2015. Wall has been selling, “See, the way my wrist was set up…”, to anyone who’ll listen ever since. He’s not just out to win this series, but to redeem his failures during the 2015 matchup as well.
Schröder (24.0 PPG, 7.5 APG, 3.5 RPG, 1.5 TOs/game) knows this, and when Wall starts selling wolf tickets and staredowns just for doing his job, Dennis recognizes it for what it really is: desperation. When these point guards go head-to-head, there is only one Third Round Virgin on the floor.
Dennis is perfectly fine playing the role of the fly in Wall’s ointment, as Wall’s endless swatting at Schröder serves to distract him from the true tasks at hand. Dennis would like to accomplish more than just getting under the All-Star guard’s skin from game to game, but he needs a lot more help than he has received thus far in this series.
Hawks fans don’t need to see the “best duo” at the pick-and-roll performing today, they merely need to see a 1-5 combo for the Hawks that is at least functional on the offensive end. Howard (6.5 PPG, 5-for-11 FGs) has had his lunch eaten to this point by former understudy Marcin Gortat (14.0 PPG, 66.7 FG%, 6.0 offensive RPG, 3.5 BPG). It’s part of the reason coach Mike Budenholzer has been leaving his $25 million free agent prize to sit on his hands in the clutch. But even when the Hawks go “small”, they have been mere witnesses to Wall’s paint dimes to Gortat, the true “best duo” that is far more experienced than anything Atlanta can field.
Howard was on the floor in the third quarter, when Atlanta’s starting unit gained the upper hand for the first time in this series. His presence around the offensive post in the fourth-quarter of Game 2, were he fed the ball, could have prematurely ended the day for Washington’s key healthy bigs. Dwight’s absence on the other end resulted in productive second-chance buckets for the Wizards. Whether Howard struggles for stretches or not, if he’s getting less floor time than Bazemore, the Hawks are not winning playoff games versus the Wizards or anyone else.
With Tim Hardaway, Jr. at his side, with Kent Bazemore getting floor time beyond anyone’s comfort level, with Ersan Ilyasova and Mike Dunleavy, Jr. at his occasional disposal, there is no reason why Dennis (4-for-13 3FGs; 8 teammates a combined 11-for-32 3FGs) should be leading the team in three-pointers made. Inside and out, the ball has been moving better for Atlanta, allowing them to stay within shouting distance of the Wizards in the second halves. But to gain and sustain leads, it is imperative for Schröder’s shooters to produce from the perimeter.
The Hawks made hay as one of the NBA’s best at forcing turnovers (15.6 opponent TOs per possession, 2nd in NBA regular season, tied with Washington). But whether it has been the starters or the reserves, Atlanta has sat back and allowed the Wizards (10.0 TO%, tied with Milwaukee as best among East playoff teams) to dissect them.
Meanwhile, the Hawks have stayed true to their sloppy selves (17.0 TO%, by far the worst in the playoffs), even as Schröder has been uncharacteristically careful. Dennis will make his fair share of mistakes, as the first-year starter is apt to do. But he cannot be left hanging out to dry by his teammates while the Wizards spark Wall on fastbreaks.
For all the praise he has heaped upon Malcolm Delaney this season, Coach Bud needs to show Atlanta why it was worth the trouble to stay true to him. Delaney and Thabo Sefolosha (4 combined minutes to date, all by Sefolosha) need to devour some of the playing time bestowed upon Bazemore, who was atrocious at the close of Game 2.
Delaney (and perhaps you, reading this) are better on-ball defensive options than Jose Calderon versus Brandon Jennings, the backup point whose late dash helped the Wizards turn the tide early in the final quarter of Game 2’s 109-101 win. Sefolosha is purportedly healthy, and should have a vital role in evening out the turnover margin in this series. He could also do a better job defensively than Hardaway did in containing Bradley Beal, whose 16 fourth-quarter points eclipsed Millsap’s 14 third-quarter points in Game 2.
Game 3 and Game 4 are prime opportunities for the Hawks to show the NBA world what being True To Atlanta is all about, and for Dennis to show why he is truly a Menace. Meanwhile, John Wall won’t make it easy to be Schröder’s Instagram foil anymore. Ain’t that right, John? High-five, up top… no, John, with your shooting hand…
Let’s Go Hawks!
~lw3
