Peachtree Hoops: Power Rankings Roundup: Crossing the halfway point

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Dale Zanine-USA TODAY Sports

Taking a look at this week’s power rankings.

It was a fun week for fans of the Atlanta Hawks, especially considering what transpired up until this point for this season. The Hawks started the week off with bringing point guard Jeff Teague back to the team the drafted him, and Atlanta managed to pick up a couple of wins in the process. One of these wins happened to be in San Antonio, which we all know hasn’t occurred in a very, very long time.

With that in mind, we dive into this week’s power rankings, and Tommy Beer of Yahoo Sports has the Hawks at No. 30 this time around.

Jeff Teague made his Hawks debut on Saturday and scored 15 points with three rebounds, seven assists, one steal, one block and one 3-pointer in 25 minutes. It will be interesting to see how much time Teague sees playing alongside Trae Young over the second half of the season.

The folks at ESPN also puts the Hawks at No. 30.

The Hawks defeated the Spurs on Friday, earning their first win inside the AT&T Center. It was Atlanta’s first victory in San Antonio since Feb. 21, 1997, snapping a 21-game road losing streak. The Hawks have lost 18 road games this season, worst in the Eastern Conference. — Spears

Michael Shapiro of Sports Illustrated continues the trend with putting Atlanta at No. 30.

Trae Young received some help last week as Jeff Teague returned to Atlanta, though Teague’s arrival may not be the assistance Young was looking for. The Hawks are dreadful defensively, and they have a glaring weakness in the frontcourt. Teague is a familiar face and a fan favorite. He won’t help stabilize the Hawks anytime soon.

John Schuhmann of NBA.com manages to change things up a bit with putting the Hawks at No. 28.

The very early returns on the quest of Jeff Teague (re-acquired on Thursday) to keep the Atlanta offense afloat when Trae Young sits down: Though Teague made six of his nine shots against Detroit on Saturday, the Hawks scored just 43 points on 44 possessions with Young on the bench. Of course, the offense wasn’t any better with Young on the floor and the defense was downright awful as the Hawks allowed the Pistons to score 32 points or more in all four quarters.

Prior to that, Young totalled 67 points as the Hawks won two straight games (vs. Phoenix and at San Antonio) for the first time since the first two games of the season. When the Spurs trapped him in the final seconds on Friday, he quickly got off the ball, allowing Kevin Huerter to hit the game-winner from the weak-side corner. Red Velvet is 3-for-3 on shots to tie or take the lead in the final minute of the fourth quarter or overtime.

Finally, CBS Sports also seems to break the trend with moving the Hawks up to No. 27 overall.

The Hawks finally got to tally something in the win column this week, beating the Suns and Spurs before being blown out at home by the Pistons. Trae Young averaged 27.7 points and 8.7 assists for the week, while Jeff Teague put up 15 points and seven assists in 25 minutes in his return to Atlanta.

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Well, that’s it for this week’s rankings and it appears the Hawks, for the most part, are still in the very bottom tier of the league. The Hawks have been a bit more competitive, however, and it would take a bit more to convince some of the nation’s writers to move the team up.

As always leave your thoughts below.

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