The Atlanta Hawks notched their seventh-straight victory with a 124-112 victory over the Dallas Mavericks at State Farm Arena on Tuesday night. Nickeil Alexander-Walker scored a game-high 29 points with Jalen Johnson adding 27 points. For the Mavericks, a hot burst in the third quarter saw Klay Thompson lead the Mavericks with 21 points with Kris Middleton adding 16 points off the bench.
Entering the game on a six-game win streak, in addition to the Mavericks’ position on the season at this point,
the Hawks entered this contest with a mantra similar to a number of games that have dropped on their schedule after the All-Star break: take care of business.
The hosts certainly played to that mantra in the first quarter, establishing a double-digit lead A balanced scoring effort — led by Onyeka Okongwu’s nine points — helped the Hawks score 40 points in the first quarter, seemingly setting up what was looking like an easy victory.
All appeared to be going to plan, but the Hawks’ second unit really slowed the offensive work that had been done in the first quarter. While Mo Gueye had some good flashes in the second quarter (including a charge, two offensive rebounds, and five points), the others — Jock Landale, Zaccharie Risacher, Corey Kispert — struggled to make a tangible impacts on this game (though, Landale made a literal physical impact at times near the rim).
Despite shooting 61% in the second quarter, the Mavericks only outscored the Hawks by three points, in part helped by a shot disparity of 18-to-24 attempts in the Hawks’ favor, with four offensive rebounds contributing.
The third quarter looked as though the Hawks would finally put the distance between the two sides, taking an 18 point lead through a Gabe Vincent three with 5:08 remaining in the third. While young star Cooper Flagg struggled in this game (more on that later), it was the veterans that pulled the Mavericks back into the game.
After that Vincent three, the Mavericks outscored the Hawks 22-8 in the remaining five minutes, with Thompson and Middleton scoring 18 of those 22 points. Thompson found form, taking advantage of Risacher’s inexperience, while Middleton was a steady force getting to his spots.
“We just broke down,” said Hawks head coach Quin Snyder of Klay Thompson. “I mean, there are positions where we’re standing, watching, and he’s in the corner, and we can get there. We didn’t during that stretch, and we didn’t during other stretches…”
The Hawks’ second unit, again, didn’t covet themselves in glory with their play in the third quarter, and with CJ McCollum also struggling at times in this game (shooting 5-of-15 from the field)
Middleton would tie the game at 97 apiece with 9:02 remaining in the game, and it was the Hawks’ quick response that helped them re-establish their foothold in this game.
A missed three from Alexander-Walker is rebounded by Dyson Daniels, who wants to try and get the ball to Johnson. The Mavericks deny the ball to him, and the screen from Okongwu frees up Johnson on the cut, and Daniels threads the needle to find him for the finish at the rim, plus the foul:
As the shot clock is beginning to wind down, Alexander-Walker steps up to the ball screen, and as Flagg looks to drive left, Alexander-Walker gets his hands down low to poke the ball loose. Kispert goes down to the floor to attempt to recover the loose ball, and by the time all of this has transpired the Mavericks need to get a shot up. Naji Marshall obliges, but can’t convert the three:
A great defensive stance from Alexander-Walker here, stepping up to the screen and managing to poke the ball free on the drive rejecting the screen.
The Hawks quickly establish a five-point lead as lax defense inside the paint allows Okongwu to muscle his way inside and finish at the rim:
After Thompson and Johnson traded threes, the Hawks’ lead would not fall under four points for the rest of the game, before back-to-back threes from Alexander-Walker put the game beyond reach for good with around two minutes remaining. The Hawks eased to a 12-point victory in the end, but they deserve credit for making the quick reply when the Mavericks tied the game, and they did it on both ends of the floor.
Postgame, Snyder was disappointed to see the Hawks’ once-18-point lead disappear in the third, but was pleased with his side’s response.
“We’ve executed really efficiently late,” said Snyder. “What we didn’t do tonight, which we’ve been pretty consistent on, is the 38-point third quarter, where we just traded (baskets) for a while. When you do that — and then we go through a stretch where we had some good looks — you miss a couple, and all of a sudden a lead you worked really hard to build disappears and you create game pressure. The flip side of that is that we handled the game pressure well. There’s some situations that we just didn’t execute, and we’ll have a chance to look at those and get better.”
“That third quarter we gave a big 40 points, which is too much,” added Dyson Daniels. “It was on the defensive end, we weren’t getting stops, Klay was getting hot, we had to take him out of the game and make other people try and beat us. Once we started getting stops, getting the game back on our terms, we were able to get out and run. We executed really well down the stretch. We had a little lapse there in that third, fourth quarter, but glad we could come back from it.”
When the Hawks needed big plays, Jalen Johnson (13 fourth quarter points) and Nickeil Alexander-Walker (hitting those back-to-back threes) combined to provide those plays. The Hawks were asked about this tandem after the game, with Quin Snyder praised Johnson getting off the ball — in addition to getting to the rim — and allowing Alexander-Walker to hit those big shots.
“…Jalen’s willingness to get off the ball and find Nickeil (and) Nickeil hit big shots, and JJ got to the rim, got to the line, those guys executed” said Snyder of Johnson and Alexander-Walker in late game situations.
Johnson himself praised Alexander-Walker’s intelligence, and how he and Alexander-Walker have made use of practice time to further develop their chemistry.
“Nickeil’s a hell of a player, obviously, and he’s somebody that’s really smart,” said Johnson of Alexander-Walker. “Just something we’ve been doing in practice is just continue to rip out certain actions we’re in together. So, just developing our chemistry and just figuring out ways we can get each other open, find stuff we like, and different actions we like. So it’s been good.”
Johnson finished with 27 points — 17 coming in the second half — on 10-of-18 shooting from the field, seven rebounds, and eight assists. Johnson did a good job of exploiting his physical advantage inside, and not settling for three.
There havebeen times this season where Johnson could settle for seven three-point attempts, but he took just five in this spot, making two. Johnson was a constant threat at the rim, and the passing ability of Dyson Daniels (five of his 10 assists delivered to Johnson) helped open up the floor for Johnson, this give-and-go from Daniels to Johnson for the dunk being the pick of the bunch:
Speaking of Daniels’ playmaking, his 10-assist, 0-turnover game runs his amazing recent assist to turnover ratio: four turnovers to 50 assists since the Hawks’ win-streak began on Feb 22nd. Postgame, there was (rightly) a lot of praise for Daniels’ playmaking.
“Dyson’s been huge for us,” said Johnson of Daniels. “Not just over this win streak, but the whole year. Dyson brings pretty much every aspect to the game, and he’s somebody that’s just always willing to get better and always willing to learn. 50 assists to four turnovers? That’s insane, it’s just a testament to his work, and obviously we need him to keep being big for us.”
“He’s been really steady,” added Alexander-Walker of Daniels. “He gets to the paint at will, and he’s poised. He does a really good job playing off of two feet and staying under control. I think that’s why he’s had success making plays for others. He’s really starting to slow down, and the game is slowing down for him as well.”
Daniels himself attributed his playmaking success and confidence to decision-making, and getting into the paint to utilize his teammates’ spacing.
“I think for me, it’s just about making the right decisions,” said Daniels in gaining confidence as a ball-handler/playmaker. “A lot of my game is trying to get feet in the paint, find my teammates. whether it be cutting, circle behind, kick out threes, that sort of thing. They make my job easy just by spacing and stuff. When we run in transition is when we look really good. Guys space, we get to the rim, the lane opens up. That’s really good, I want to keep my turnovers down and assists up, so I hope we can keep that rolling.”
While Daniels shooting a, sadly, woeful percentage from three is unfortunate, in last night’s matchup it allowed Daniels to see the floor more than perhaps he may have otherwise seen it, and plays developed within this extra space.
“…The way they were playing me today as well with the big sitting off so much, I was able to see the floor a lot better and make plays,” added Daniels. “Every night’s going to be different scouts, different coverages. It’s just we have to go in and execute against that. I thought we did a pretty good job tonight.”
Daniels’ defense was fantastic, and there’s a lot to be said here as well. The main avenue for a Mavericks upset win would have been Cooper Flagg erupting for a 30 or 40 point-plus game. Now, they got close in the fourth with a Klay Thompson mini-eruption, but without Flagg having a big night offensively it was going to be tough to envisage a Mavericks victory — Dyson Daniels helped ensure that no such night occurred.
A play that set a tone early was this knock-away from Daniels on Flagg on the baseline, leading to a steal:
Daniels wasn’t alone in enforcing the defense on Flagg, who the Hawks allowed to see a second body on drives — their gameplan for defending Flagg was clear to see and well executed.
On the drive from Flagg, McCollum is the extra defender that picks up the dribble, forcing Flagg to pick up his dribble, pivot, and when he tries to lift a shot inside it’s rejected by Onyeka Okongwu:
On the drive, Daniels is happy for Flagg to wander to an extra body, this time, Okongwu, and the attempted pass inside to Marshall doinks off his head and out of bounds:
On a swing to the weakside corner, Flagg’s fake takes him past Johnson, but Daniels is waiting to contest, and his vertical challenge forces Flagg to try and adjust to finish with a reverse, and Okongwu is there to knock the shot out of bounds:
Flagg finished with 14 points on 6-of-16 shooting, and in a 12 point victory, the Hawks limiting Flagg was one of the defining elements of this game. Daniels was asked about guarding Cooper Flagg postgame, and praised his teammates for switching and moving bodies for each other.
“I’ve never played Cooper Flagg, or seen him play before, this was the first time I really went up against him and he’s going to be a great player over time,” said Daniels. “Once I come up against players I’ve already seen before, I know what they like to do, I know their tendencies. So, it’s about taking that away. Every night’s going to be somewhat difficult. Every team has a great player. For me, it’s just about being locked in on that assignment, making sure I make their life as difficult as possible, making them take tough shots. As a team, we’ve been doing a really good job shifting for each other, switching and keeping the same coverages as well. So, we just got to continue to do that.”
As a whole, Daniels believes that his season started slow defensively, and has picked up the challenge of guarding the opposition’s best offensive player of late.
“…I feel like I started the season slow with my defense,” said Daniels of his defense. “The last few games have kind of taken the challenge of really getting the best player every night and trying to take him out of the game.”
Overall, the Hawks did a great job of turning defense to offense, scoring 21 points off of turnovers, and 26 fastbreak points. When the Hawks are able to get those stops/force those turnovers and can get out and run, it’s arguably Atlanta at its best offensively. Johnson can pass and run, Daniels is able to lead passes in transition, Alexander-Walker is excellent at running the floor, Okongwu can threaten from behind the arc, Mo Gueye is a good rim-runner. There’s a lot of options for the Hawks to exploit their opponents in transition once they get going (fifth in the NBA at points off of turnovers, and second in the league in fastbreak points).
Elsewhere offensively, Daniels shot an efficient 6-of-11 from the field for 14 points to go with those 10 assists, Okongwu shot 7-of-12 from the field for 18 points, including 3-of-5 from three to go with nine rebounds and four blocks. If there was a criticism of the Hawks last night, their bench play was really poor last night, and allowed Dallas to get back in this game twice.
Landale was a tough 0-of-5, and any positive contribution Risacher made to this game was undone by his defense of Thompson in the third quarter; ‘Know Your Personnel’ is a well-known defensive principle which would apply here. McCollum’s play with the bench unit wasn’t brilliant, and Kispert didn’t add a ton (two points on 1-of-3 shooting) in nearly 15 minutes. Any consistent bench play and this game is a blowout, and on another night against stronger opposition it would cost them far more than it did against the Mavericks.
Ultimately, the Hawks took care of business and run their winning streak to a current NBA-best seven games. However, the Hawks’ focus is on a playoff berth, taking it one game at a time.
“It’s been good,” said Johnson of the Hawks’ seven-game win-streak. “I think the biggest thing is just us taking it one game at a time. We’re not focused on a win streak, that’s not our end-goal. Our end goal is to make a playoff push, and the best way to focus on doing that is just taking it one game at a time and continue to stay together throughout this. Obviously, we’re winning, but understanding what we need to get better at moving forward, because we’re going to have some closer and tougher games. The more we stay together through it, I think it’ll be good.”
A comeback victory for Philadelphia against Memphis, a narrow victory for Charlotte over Portland, and Bam Adebayo’s 83 points (what.) saw the Hawks’ immediate playoff rivals all notch victories on Tuesday, so it’s important for the Hawks that this run continues.
Fortunately, the schedule may allow for this run to continue: Brooklyn is the Hawks’ next opponent, followed by Milwaukee. Then, a potentially pivotal game against the Orlando Magic at State Farm Arena awaits — a chance to, potentially, run the streak to 10 and notch a victory over a direct rival… that’s the big game to circle in the Hawks’ upcoming schedule.
In the meantime, the Hawks (34-31) remain in Atlanta to take on the Brooklyn Nets (17-48) on Thursday night at State Farm Arena.
Until next time!
