HAWKS VS MAGIC PLAYIN PREVIEW: HAWKS POV
Injuries:
Hawks:
Jalen Johnson
Kobe Bufkin
Clint Capela
Larry Nance Jr
Trae Young (Probable) - we all know they bullshitin
Magic:
Jalen Suggs
Mo Wagner
PREVIOUS MATCHUPS:
Hawks 117-105 Magic - Fake result, G leaguers
Hawks 112-119 Magic
Hawks 108-114 Magic
Hawks 112-106 Magic
KEYS TO THE GAME:
PACE
One of the fastest teams in the NBA vs one of the slowest, If the Hawks can dictate the tempo of the game, play fast in transition and get some easy buckets of Trae outlet passes, Dyson and Zacc on fast breaks and getting into sets quickly which we didn’t last week, we will have a leg up on them. Especially since the Magic struggle to get plays running quickly.
POSSESSION GAME
High steal teams, the one that wins the turnover battle tends to win the game in this matchup, but going back to last week the reason the game was somewhat close, was because we offensive rebounded the ball so well, when we weren’t winning the turnover battle, we have to be crashing the board, players like Mo Gueye are important for that. Obviously Dyson Daniels is gone a be important, he needs to be at his best in forcing turnovers and then everybody has to be playing smart controlled basketball and playing high intensity to match an Orlando team that out worked us last week forcing tonnes of bad mistakes from turnovers and especially reducing the number of those in our own half. Luckily, Trae has been on a pretty good run of low turnovers, and was not the problem on Tuesday last week so hopefully we can win this.
SHOOTING
Simply if we lose the shooting battle, we will lose. We lost it on Tuesday and we remarkably kept it somewhat close. But if we allow the magic to shoot close to 50% like last week this won’t go well. Luckily that is a rare situation to be in vs the magic but this has become way more common for them recently. We need to keep their streaky inconsistent shooters down and/or keep the attempts low. And we need our shooters to be efficient, find space and make nice plays on the perimeter for those guys and the game will swing our way.
SWING PLAYERS:
TRAE YOUNG*
Has the Most experience on this team, he's the leader and is a great play-in and competitive game performer, very clutch and I think this game will come down to the wire and he will be vital to any winning situation this game could go.
MO GUEYE
His size is important in a game we are small in, they are gonna beat us in the paint but reducing their possessions with regular rebounding and increasing our possessions on the offensive board like we’ve seen with him recently and if he can do that and stay consistent and play under pressure in his first big situation game.
ZACC AND THE NEW GUYS
Purely we need all these guys to be efficient, Risacher is the big one. He has pace, size and transition play which will help with all of my keys for this game, and if he hits a pocket where he's making upwards of 5 threes and gets into a rhythm like he dis vs the Nets and the Bucks recently, he will push us to victory here I’m sure, thing to watch with him is the fouling, last week he got in foul trouble and only ended up playing 16 minutes and I think when he was on he was pretty impactful for us. In addition to Zacc, the new guys have to be effective. Levert, Niang, Mann are all important shooters off the Bench for us and in rotation, two of those guys got a vital rest the other night, Mann played pretty well in that win. But rarely do they all shoot efficiently all at the same time. If I was to compliment one of them, I think Mann is pretty consistent for us meanwhile Niang and LeVert are more up and down. LeVert’s shooting has been a little all over the place recently, been on a bad run but had a huge shooting night vs the nets, if he can bring that form over to this game after the rest I’d be very confident. And Niang usually puts a few good shooting games in a row and I think we are currently in one of those runs. If we can get all these guys to shoot efficiently, we will definitely win this game. If we get 3/4 of these guys to shoot efficiently, good chance we win. If we get 2/4, I’m a lot less confident.
WHO TO WATCH/STOP:
KCP
Simply a great 3&D two guard, whose shot has been poor all year, but recently has been falling. If we can hold him at bay they will have to rely on their younger players and less experienced guys to produce spacing and shooting. Guys like Caleb Houston will be important then and I’d be pretty confident if we could limit him.
THE CENTERS
The Magic outsize us quite a bit, I don’t think this is entirely necessary since I think its gonna be hard anyway top limit these guys fully, but if we can hold them to lower attempts and reduce the offensive rebounds we are taking away a lot of the advantage for them. Having Paolo being guarded by Okongwu means there’s a power forward in Gueye on their center and that isn’t a bad matchup per say but their forwards are gonna have a size advantage, we gotta balance the center position out.
FINAL NOTES:
This is gonna be a fun game, it’s gonna be intense, it will most likely come down to the final few minutes and we have to enjoy as much competitive basketball as possible. But want to stress how important it is for the Hawks to make these playoffs. There is simply no benefit for us to miss this year, no pick and no shot to jump up, we have to avoid being embarrassed and giving up a lottery pick. Not only that, it’s important for us to get these young guys playoff reps. Dyson Zacc, Gueye etc. will all benefit from competitive basketball even if we have 0 expectations when we get there. We are gonna get another opportunity to make these playoffs if we lose, but I don’t want it to go up to chance and I’m Sure you don’t want it to either. Its gonna be a competitive one, a physical one, something to watch is the foul game as the magic are very physical. So have fun, be optimistic I think we have a good chance but this will certainly be very interesting.