They haven’t always shot particularly well, or defended particularly well, and there even have been times when arguably the most focused team in the NBA during the regular season seemed less than zeroed-in.
“Our on-the-ball defense could be better,” Kyle Korver said Friday. “We’ve had a lot of blow-bys. That’s not usually one of the things we have to talk about.”
The difference this season: When those things happen, the Hawks win anyway.
They lead a playoff series 2-0. While you're busy picking a few specks of lint off the silk suit, understand how rare that is for this franchise: It had happened twice in the Hawks' previous 24 playoff series and nine of 44 series overall since 1969. Theirs is not a resume dotted with championships, which makes it all the more amusing that the Hawks have caused such angst with the way they are winning.
This is the playoffs. It’s not supposed to be easy. Sports is devoid of championship teams that didn’t have to overcome some combination of injury, conflict and mind lapses — usually all three. Nobody sits back when it’s over and proclaims, “Wow, that was a lot easier than I thought. Anybody want to run a marathon now?”
The fact that the Brooklyn Nets have turned out to be slightly more challenging than the spineless, boneless chicken breasts that ex-Net Paul Pierce painted them as might not be such a bad thing for the Hawks. They have been flawed and they’ve struggled and they’ve won two games anyway.
They go into Game 3 knowing that if they win Saturday, this is pretty much over. No NBA team has rebounded from a 3-0 deficit — and there have been 110 opportunities. Only three of those 110 teams even forced a Game 7.
We can speculate about what some lapses in the first two games might mean later in the playoffs. But the 2-0 lead is all that matters to them right now.
“We haven’t played our best basketball in the series yet,” Korver said, “but you can look at that as a bad thing or you can look at that as a good thing because we’re still winning the games.”
Hawks coach Mike Budenholzer understands why some might be critical, saying, “If people say the Hawks haven’t played their best basketball, I don’t think that’s a totally dishonest assessment.”
But he kinda likes that. He’s like most coaches: They can’t get through a day without something to be a little miserable about. It keeps everybody on an edge, at least in theory.
There’s also this: “There’s something to be said for finding ways to win games, even when maybe some players aren’t playing as well as you’d like or they’d like. We’ve had other guys step up. That’s been our formula all year.”
Paul Millsap struggled in the series opener with a sore shoulder (2-for-11, six points), but he shed his confining padded shirt in Game 2 and started to look like his old self (7-for-11, 19 points). Al Horford suffered a dislocated pinkie in Game 1, but with two fingers taped together, still managed 14 points and 13 rebounds in Game 2.
The Hawks have had some defensive lapses against the slow-and-old Nets. But they’ve made plays when they’ve had to and forced 33 Nets turnovers (including 22 steals) in the two games.
Anybody who cared about style points in the first two games certainly shouldn’t in the next one because another loss would drop the Nets into a bottomless pit. Brooklyn is looking at Game 3 in a best-of-seven as must-win.
“I’m sure they’ll come out with a sense of urgency,” Horford said. “We have to be prepared for that. We understand they’re not going to fold.”
The Hawks shouldn’t need a reminder about what happens when a team relaxes. In a 2008 first-round series against Boston, they were blown out by 42 points in the first two games, but came back to win the next two in Atlanta and eventually stretched the series to seven games. Celtics fans didn’t take that well. If the Hawks need motivation Saturday, I’m sure somebody can find the tape.
Korver said the Hawks can’t be thinking “split” in Brooklyn. They need to think: “sweep.”
“I think we have to realize the importance of the game in their mind,” Korver said. “It’s easy when you’re up 2-0 to relax just the littlest of bits and feel like as long as if we come in and get one we’re going to be in great shape. You’re playing with fire if you do that. That’s something you’ve got to fight. If you come in and take Game 3, you put yourself in a really great spot. That has to be our mindset.”
Another win and nobody will care about style points.
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