Official Game Thread: Hawks at Kings

[lethalweapon3]

“Welcome Back. To that same old place that you laughed about…”

 

In my head, there’s a Venn diagram swimming about. The left circle says, “Master Tactician”. The right enclosure says, “And, Who the Heck Are You, Again?”

There’s a slim space within the union, where the two circles intersect. Inside it are E.F. Hutton, and a handful of professional sports coaches. To reside there, and to have staying power, you have to have the know-how, the gravitas. And, you have to be able to convince people, most with less know-how than you, that you are worth the trouble of lending you their ears, hearts, and minds.

Maybe Luke Walton knew his way around a telestrator. Perhaps he zig-zagged those arrows and got those X’s and O’s whizzing around the whiteboard like it’s nobody’s business, enough to convince a multi-millionaire or two that he can be the second coming of Phil Jackson, or Lute Olson, or at least Bill Walton with a lot less blathering.

Unfortunately for Luke, as the head coach in charge, young players just looked at him sideways. “Who is this guy? Is Kobe not available?”

Stop me if you’ve heard something like this before, but Walton scored his NBA career-high, in this case 25 points, during a West Coast road trip by the Atlanta Hawks, in 2006 on one of the rare nights his pal Kobe was off due to injury (future TMZ special star Lamar Odom would drop his career-best of 15 assists on that evening at STAPLES, too). From then on, Walton would be a Laker mainstay.

Luke would cling to Kobe and Phil long enough to be a part of the resurgence from LOLakers back to global prominence. He’d be a starter for much the ensuing three seasons, then it was back to the bench until the 2012 Trade Deadline, when he was stapled to a first-round swap option and Jason Kapono and shipped to post-LeBron Cleveland.

It wouldn’t take long before he convinced Golden State that he was Yung Phil. “We are gonna run parts of the Triangle offense,” he assured media upon joining Steve Kerr’s bench, “and I know that thing front and back.” A year after winning his first title as an assistant, he’d put that knowledge to the test.

Steve Kerr’s back started acting up. Luke took the reins to start the season, the players said, “No worries, we got this,” and the Traingle-infused Dubs rattled off 24 straight wins, eventually going 39-4 until Kerr returned to accept the Coach of the Year award for a 73-win juggernaut.

That was enough for Lakerland, who brought him back just in time for a post-Kobe team that was upheaving its managerial leadership amidst family ownership drama. Slow growth was the plan, until LeBron came calling. Suddenly, expectations were elevated, and excuses not accepted, despite injuries to James and others taking their toll. Most importantly, Walton struggled with an accomplished LeBron giving him the “And Who Are You, Again?” look. Luke, in LeBron’s estimation, was no Mike Brown.

Three days after getting canned, Walton would land as a head coach again, this time hired by his old Laker pal Vlade Divac, who was still trying to spin straw in Sacramento with the owner-meddled Kings. He had to convince a 23-year-old star-by-default in De’Aaron Fox, and a 20-year-old Tyrese Haliburton, and a cast of similarly-aged up-and-comers, and washed-ashore veterans like ex-Warrior Harrison Barnes, that his learning curve was worth the ride.

Vlade would exit stage right after a 31-41 season. With the Kangz’ youngsters tuning him out more by the day, the team failed to improve the following season, and it wouldn’t be much longer, at the outset of the 2021-22 season, before Walton caught the short hook. Don’t cry for Luke, as he had a front row seat as a Cavs assistant for The Donovan Mitchell Variety Show on Monday night.

Brown assumed Walton’s seat beside Kerr at Golden State in 2016. When the latter’s chronic back issues flared up once more as the 2017 Playoffs approached, the Warriors’ players said, “No worries, we got this,” and were unstoppable for a dozen games in sweeping their way back to the NBA Finals.

One season after terminating Walton, Brown is in Walton’s seat once again. The challenge for Brown, in Sacramento, is getting players not named LeBron, or Kobe, or Steph ‘n Klay in what was supposed to be their primes, to value what you bring to the table in the current day.

Brown doesn’t have as tough a challenge, in 2022-23, getting his Kings to comport as the Hawks’ Nate McMillan. It was evident last night, as the shifty, speedy Fox scored 22 fourth-quarter points, including the game-winning blow-by lay-up to gut out a win in Utah in a January matchup no one imagined would be worth watching.

“Mike Brown has seen the light with De’Aaron,” Kings-fan podcaster Morgan Ragan shared after the light-beaming win. “De’Aaron has seen the light with his game. He truly has taken so many steps, and has evolved as a player to make an impact, not only as an individual, but for an entire squad.

The stats are bearing that out for Fox (career-highs of 55.5 eFG% and 78.9 FT%), who shares the starting unit with several decent space-makers, including Kevin Huerter (team-high 42.0 3FG%) and NBA rebounding leader Domantas Sabonis (12.4 RPG, ahead of the sidelined Hawk Clint Capela’s 11.9; 41.9 3FG%). As with his two blocks and a steal last night against the Jazz, the Kings’ lead guard is displaying a commitment under Brown to no longer rely, purely, upon his offensive prowess.

Alex Len hardly has to lift a finger these days, thanks to Sabonis (70.2 FG%, 24.5 PPG, 12.3 RPG, 6.3 APG in last four games, after missing a contest due to a fractured thumb). But Monte McNair and Sacramento management recognizes they may need more than gunner Malik Monk and Davion Mitchell off the bench to secure at least a shot at the postseason via the Play-Ins.

The Kings (20-16, 3.5 games out of 1^st in NBA West, but just 4 games ahead of the 11^th seed) could be the first since 2006 to reach the NBA Playoffs, and everyone around Sactown is starving to get there. They’re 11-3 versus sub-.500 teams like the Hawks, and their schedule gets stronger and more compact once the All-Star Break ends.

It won’t take much for Brown to get his team motivated to play well, from start to finish, against the Hawks. One night after a big win in Memphis extended Sacramento’s winning streak to seven, everyone aside from Huerter and Monk was flat from the perimeter. The Kings succumbed to Trae Young’s 35 points in a 115-106 loss at Atlanta, one of the streak-busting Hawks’ last genuinely satisfying victories. Sacramento fell to 0-2 on SEGABABAs, but are 3-0 since then, the mark of a young team learning to handle adversity on the fly, with help from its coaching staff.

Brown has been a regular-season winner in every full year as a coach, but one. In Cleveland in 2013-14, he had to bend the ears of a 21-year-old Kyrie, 22-year-old Tristan Thompson, and the likes of Dion Waiters and Andrew Bynum and Anthony Bennett, with no LeBron around to save any of them.

But it appears Brown learned, from that one experience, that he must adjust his strategies and his rotation styles to meet the needs of the day. Whatever you accomplished in the Aughts, or in a pinch as a replacement, is fine and all.

But players of all ages these days, pre- and post-career-altering surgeries, are entering arenas dropping 47, and 55, and 71. Vastly inexperienced players, with or without their own star teammates, are coming in ready to hang 150 points on reigning NBA Finalists. Your team wants to feel confident you’re prepared to help them overcome and win games despite all that. Once they grow skeptical of your capacities, they’ll tune you out.

Still two wins shy of 750 as a head coach, McMillan will go down in history as one of The Association’s all-time greatest clean-up artists. At every one of his NBA stops, though, he runs into walls when the time comes to stage a boffo second act.

Taking over often toxic situations, he dumbs down the schemes for his young charges to soak up, to lauded effect. But those schemes don’t wise up, not when it becomes necessary for the mission-critical performers under his wing to do the same. Granted enough time, with the aid of simplification, Nate can get you out of a 20-plus-points hole, or eight games below .500, to look the part a halfway decent competitor by the end. But then what?

After climbing out from yet another deep hole, then blowing several opportunities to put away a more shorthanded Warriors team in San Francisco, McMillan’s Hawks enter Golden 1 Center tonight (10 PM Eastern, Bally Sports Southeast and 92.9 FM in ATL, NBC Sports California) at 17-20 (6-12 on the road). It’s the same number of losses as the 14-20 team Nate reluctantly took over from Lloyd Pierce in 2021, kickstarting the magical carpet ride that Atlanta still seems to be subsisting on nearly two seasons later.

Atlanta is stuck on the same number of victories as they were last season, with the Hawks losing five in a row to drop to 17-25 right before MLK Day. Until Monday night, they had not lost four in a row since, a sign of a team that was willing to do just enough to avoid falling into the NBA abyss, if not much more.

McMillan failed at different stretches of the Warriors game, a 143-141 double-overtime defeat, to play John Collins and Onyeka Okongwu together, or to play upstarts AJ Griffin and Jalen Johnson at all. That rest had better pay dividends tonight versus a Kings team returning from Salt Lake City today, after narrowly avoiding overtime play themselves.

With De’Andre Hunter (two blocks, two steals, two assists, two threes, but too stilted in crunch time to matter in his return @ GSW) back in the starting unit with Okongwu and Collins, McMillan has no one off the bench to turn to when frontcourt stops are essential. If there is one young Hawk left these days that’s willing to imbibe whatever McMillan pours out, it’s Griffin.

AJ’s combination of shot profile, assertiveness and size would be, in this rando’s opinion, more suitable to Atlanta’s starting lineup, while Hunter brings a dash of on-ball defense off the bench. Keeping former Kings prize Bogi Bogdanovic from having to run and snipe and guard anyone beyond 40 minutes would be a bonus, too. But Nate, for the first time in his elongated coaching career, would have to be willing to trust that a teenager will listen to what he has to say.

Catchphrases can carry a modern-day NBA head coach, particularly one with unimaginative schemes, only so far. To make it through the end of this season, perhaps even this month, McMillan needs inspiration himself to figure out how to reignite the flames of the players he shepherds. For that inspiration, Nate needs only to peer at his peer just a few yards down the sideline, to see how it’s presently being done. A fellow shepherd, around the clock, Brown has his team giving a flock.

 

Let’s Go Hawks!

~lw3

[JayBirdHawk]

14 minutes ago, lethalweapon3 said:

McMillan failed at different stretches of the Warriors game, a 143-141 double-overtime defeat, to play John Collins and Onyeka Okongwu together, or to play upstarts AJ Griffin and Jalen Johnson at all. That rest had better pay dividends tonight versus a Kings team returning from Salt Lake City today, after narrowly avoiding overtime play themselves.

With De’Andre Hunter (two blocks, two steals, two assists, two threes, but too stilted in crunch time to matter in his return @ GSW) back in the starting unit with Okongwu and Collins, McMillan has no one off the bench to turn to when frontcourt stops are essential. If there is one young Hawk left these days that’s willing to imbibe whatever McMillan pours out, it’s Griffin.

AJ’s combination of shot profile, assertiveness and size would be, in this rando’s opinion, more suitable to Atlanta’s starting lineup, while Hunter brings a dash of on-ball defense off the bench. Keeping former Kings prize Bogi Bogdanovic from having to run and snipe and guard anyone beyond 40 minutes would be a bonus, too. But Nate, for the first time in his elongated coaching career, would have to be willing to trust that a teenager will listen to what he has to say

Well said!

[lethalweapon3]

Nate probably won't get a better person to provide a Sacramento scouting report than assistant Mike Longabardi, who helped Alvin Gentry try and figure out after the Trade Deadline how best to fold acquisitions Sabonis and (as much as it pains me to bring his name up) Donte DiVincenzo into the Kings' rotations last season.

~lw3

[lethalweapon3]

Clint's the sole Hawk on the Boo-Boo Report (still out, strained calf).

The Kings' shortlist is not submitted yet as it's still morning out there. Huerter (sore back) and Monk (sore shoulder) were listed as questionable before last night's game in SLC, but were activated anyway (combined 47 minutes, 2-for-9 3FGs).

~lw3

[Gray Mule]

My eastern team (Hawks) visit my western team (Kings) tonight.  Both teams had their last game decided in the last seconds of the game.  Hawks lost.  Kings won.  Not the same game.

Sabonis, King, Murray, Red Velvet. to name a few Kings.  Will the Hawks have many out, injured?  Everyone needed.

[Dnice]

Another game without Clint, is another loss.

[lethalweapon3]

No one aside from G-League assignments on the Kings' injury/illness list.

~lw3

[BrazilianHawk]

 

LET'S GO HAWKS! 

[cam1218]

The Hawk’s FB had a picture of Kevin Huerter and Justin Holiday promoting this game. Why Hawks social media team, why?

[Dnice]

3 minutes ago, cam1218 said:

The Hawk’s FB had a picture of Kevin Huerter and Justin Holiday promoting this game. Why Hawks social media team, why?

They do odd crap sometimes, not sure about the opponents,  but they've used at least 9 players or so in the game preview. 

At least it was more of a true position matchup. 

[cam1218]

11 minutes ago, Dnice said:

They do odd crap sometimes, not sure about the opponents,  but they've used at least 9 players or so in the game preview. 

At least it was more of a true position matchup. 

They do odd stuff sometimes, including picking awful pictures. I remember one last year of Huerter that looked like he had been on a 10 day drinking binge. 

[JayBirdHawk]

 

 

[Spud2nique]

7 hours ago, lethalweapon3 said:

Alex Len hardly has to lift a finger these days,

What’s the change? 

 

7 hours ago, lethalweapon3 said:

Okongwu

He’s going nuts tonight!!! 
 

Thanks @lethalweapon3 I targeted Huerter in the 2K game hounded him all over the place. Huerter fell into

the stands, Huerter ran into  JC pick but JC called for a moving screen it was BS! 

Vegas has Sac -1.5

 

2k Hawks by 11

 

GO HAWKS!!!

[lethalweapon3]

Learned way more than I expected to learn about Atmospheric Rivers, which can be far more problematic than Doc. Hoping everyone in NorCal making it to and through this game gets home safely.

From protests to wildfire smoke to now Pacific storms, something is always afoot outside Golden 1 whenever the Hawks are on these Cali trips.

~lw3

[Sothron]

here's hoping we can win tonight. I could use it right about now.

[TheNorthCydeRises]

rebound

Rebound

REBOUND

[JayBirdHawk]

13 minutes ago, Sothron said:

here's hoping we can win tonight. I could use it right about now.

For you and kg and all Squawkers who are going through real life issues.

[TheNorthCydeRises]

Come out aggressive Trae.  Don't let this team fall behind early.

[JayBirdHawk]

Just now, TheNorthCydeRises said:

rebound

Rebound

REBOUND

Say it one more time. Please!

[TheNorthCydeRises]

Was that Trae moving off the ball on the first play?