It’s long been apparent that the Hawks wouldn’t make the playoffs this season, ending a 10-year streak of postseason berths for the franchise.
Yet Hawks center Mike Muscala, who played on four of those teams, said it still was jarring to see headlines about the streak coming to an end.
“That was a little unfortunate to read,” Muscala said. “But we have to move forward and keep getting better. Even though we aren’t in the playoffs, there are still a lot of games to improve with young guys and start building for next year.”
The Hawks (20-47) overhauled their roster under first-year general manager Travis Schlenk. His plan is to rebuild by acquiring draft picks and young players, while signing veterans to short-term contracts that don’t tie up much salary-cap space.
The Hawks’ playoffs steak began in 2007-08 with GM Billy Knight and coach Mike Woodson. That duo, like Schlenk now, had executed a rebuild with the draft as the main focus.
The postseason streak continued under Hawks GM Rick Sund and coach Larry Drew. It kept going with GMs Danny Ferry and Wes Wilcox and coach Mike Budenholzer, who succeeded Ferry as the top basketball executive in 2015.
“There’s a lot of credit to the groups that have done that before I was here, to do it for six years before I was here, and then my first four years,” Budenholzer said. “Making the playoffs in this league is not easy. ... I’m proud of the (postseason) teams that I got to coach, and I’m impressed by what came before me.”
The Hawks’ run reached its crescendo in 2014-15. They set a franchise record with 60 victories and made it to the conference finals for the first time in Atlanta. Four Hawks players were named to the Eastern Conference All-Star team and Budenholzer was voted NBA coach of the year.
“It was special,” fifth-year Hawks guard Dennis Schroder said. “We never had it before in (Atlanta) Hawks history. We made history that year, so that’s always a good thing. But today we just try to get better each game. We are pretty young. Things changed. I think pretty excited to see how it goes.”
Schlenk became the Hawks’ top basketball executive in May 2017, after Budenholzer returned to coach from president of basketball operations and GM Wilcox became a special advisor to ownership in a major organizational shakeup. Last summer Schlenk sent away two key pieces of the 2016-17 playoff team, Dwight Howard in a trade with the Hornets and All-Star forward Paul Millsap as a free agent to the Nuggets. Schlenk didn’t add comparable talent.
Prior to Schlenk, the Hawks had traded All-Star guard Jeff Teague to the Pacers and All-Star center Al Horford signed with the Celtics as a free agent in the summer of 2016. All-Star forward Kyle Korver was traded to Cleveland in January 2017.
That drain of veteran talent made it likely that the NBA’s second-longest playoffs streak would come to an end this season (the Spurs have the longest run at 20 years). The end of the Hawks’ streak became official on Sunday.
Budenholzer won’t be part of an NBA playoff team for the first time since 1996-97, his first season as a Spurs assistant coach. The Spurs missed the playoffs that year, after All-Star center David Robinson suffered a season-ending injury in the sixth game. The Spurs selected Tim Duncan with the No. 1 overall pick in the next draft and have made the playoffs every year since.
San Antonio’s streak also is in jeopardy. The Spurs (37-30) are 3-10 since Feb. 1 and entered Tuesday one-half game out of the final playoff spot in the West.
Budenholzer said he hasn’t connected lately with Spurs coach Gregg Popovich.
“But that is one of the teams I’m watching in the West,” Budenholzer said, smiling.
