Though the Hawks competed throughout the night, they could not stop the Clippers’ offensive firestorm in the final six minutes of a 149-144 loss Monday night at State Farm Arena.
The Hawks finished 4-2 on their six-game homestand. Here are five observations:
1. The Hawks continued their recent streak of exciting games despite what seemed like a slow start where they where they went 3-of-8 from the floor in the first five minutes. After going to their bench a little earlier than the usual halfway mark, the Hawks found a little bit of a spark.
That spark ignited when they leaned on the five-man unit of Dejounte Murray, Bogdan Bogdanovic, De’Andre Hunter, Jalen Johnson and Onyeka Okongwu. A 15-5 run followed and the Hawks found themselves leading 66-64 at halftime thanks to a floater by Trae Young seconds before intermission.
“I think particularly, they started really, really hot.,” Hawks coach Quin Snyder said. “And, we hung in there, even early in the game, which I thought was important and we kind of grounded our way back into it.”
2. Amidst that run, Hunter scored six of his 27 points in just three minutes of action. The Hawks wing looked to take advantage of every minute of his playing time. Hunter made just his third appearance since returning from right knee inflammation and the Hawks training staff placed him on a minutes restriction.
“This probably was the most tired I was this game,” Hunter said. “But my shot was feeling good. My teammates were finding me in good positions and I just made the shots.”
But the Hawks wing continued to show his importance helping to slow down the Clippers, who were on the second night of back-to-back games. When he went to the bench, the Hawks struggled to slow down Leonard, who continued to slice them up from all 3 levels scoring seven points.
3. The Clippers, though, did not seem like they missed many shots, knocking down 10-of-14 from deep in the first 14 minutes of the night.
Leonard powered the Clippers, scoring 36 points on 13-of-20 shooting from the floor. Five of Leonard’s shots by the end of the night came from long range but he made life tough for the Hawks on his drives to the basket. The six-time All-Star, who made 41.1% of his mid-range shots coming into the night, went 0-of-2 in that zone but went 8-of-10 inside the paint.
He had plenty of help from James Harden, who scored 30 points, had eight rebounds and 10 assists.
‘I think their team collectively to have such a group of guys that is various times in their career, have been ‘the guy’ for them,” Snyder said. “Clearly they sacrifice for one another and that makes them even better collectively.”
4. The most recent stretch of games tested Johnson as he faced several of the league’s star players. Last Tuesday he faced LeBron James, before facing Kevin Durant on Friday and Stephen Curry on Saturday. Leonard proved another test for the third-year forward, who matched up against the future Hall of Famer throughout the night.
He didn’t have one of his best nights offensively, making 3-of-14 shots from the floor despite his urgency to attack the rim. He scored nine points and continued to find ways to affect the game. He had seven rebounds and looked to make it tough for the Clippers to score.
“I know it’s hard,” Snyder said. “There’s some plays that he’ll make and he has made and we want him to continue to make sometimes the ball doesn’t go in. Those guys, they’re big, long defenders back there as well. But he didn’t let it bother him and it continued to compete.”
5. The Hawks did not have Clint Capela (left adductor strain) on Monday night and they tapped Okongwu for the start with Bruno Fernando providing minutes off the bench.
Okongwu connected on a pair of 3s and gave the Hawks some solid minutes defensively, handling switches onto smaller players. He scored 18 points and had five rebounds, four of which came on the offensive end.
When Okongwu went to the bench, the team received an energy boost from Fernando, who blocked a couple of shots. One of those blocks led to a three from Young, who ended the night with 25 points and 12 assists.
Stat to know
Trae Young (3,775) passed Mookie Blaylock for the second-most assists in club history, and is now 91 assists away from tying Doc Rivers
Quotable
“We’re under .500. We’re just trying to get back to .500 and be better than .500 So we got to get a couple of wins streaks going.” -- De’Andre Hunter on their strong homestand.
Up Next
The Hawks face the league-leading Celtics in Boston on Wednesday.
