The Atlanta Hawks have had a solid start to the season, but it has not come without problems. After starting the season 2-0 with wins over the Magic and the Hornets, the Hawks ran into a real matchup problem for them. Atlanta had back-to-back games against the Houston Rockets, one of the best teams in the NBA and a team full of athletic defenders who rebound well, and Atlanta lost both games in a similar fashion.
But it is time for the team to move on to the rest of their week ahead, where the Hawks will host the Miami Heat and the Cleveland Cavaliers before traveling to New Orleans on Saturday. Here are some burning questions I have for the week ahead in Atlanta.
1. Can the Hawks shooting improve?
Do the Hawks have a three-point shooting problem or was it just the fact that they faced the Rockets? In the loss on Monday night, Atlanta shot 28% from three and in the loss on Saturday, they shot 26.5%. Hitting tough shots against the Rockets is far from easy, but the Hawks are going to have to show they can start hitting them.
Two players in particular that need to step up from three include Jalen Johnson and Onyeka Okongwu. Johnson is currently shooting 15.8% from three while Okongwu is shooting 17.6%. When you are sharing the floor with a non-shooter like Dyson Daniels, that can complicate the offensive spacing. It would also help if Lu Dort (23.5%) would also start making shots.
Every team goes through shooting slumps and it did not help that the Hawks had to play the Rockets. But can they get back to shooting against their opponents this week?
2. Better efficiency from Jalen Johnson
When you become a star player like Johnson has, your game is going to get nitpicked every time you are on the floor. Johnson elevated into star status last season with his first All-Star appearance and first All-NBA selection and he is the Hawks best player on the floor.
But he is going to get every teams best defensive shot and he is going to have to improve his efficiency when it comes to scoring the basketball. He is shooting 43% from the floor, a horrible 15.8% from three, and has a 52.4 true shooting percentage, below the league average.
A four-game sample size is far too small, but Johnson needs to be more efficient this week to elecate the Hawks offense.
3. Better bench play
This does not inlcude Aaron Wiggins, who has been fantastic to start the year and everything the Hawks could have hoped for when they made the trade with Oklahoma City. He is shooting the ball well and has been one of the Hawks best players.
But Atlanta has to start getting more from Lu Dort, Kingston Flemings, and Jock Landale. None of those three players is shooting the ball particularly well right now and giving Atlanta any kind of production on the offensive end. Dort's defense has been below his standard and he is not shooting the ball well. Flemings is playing good defense, but has beens shy about shooting the ball. Landale is shooting the ball very poorly to start the year.
Again, some of this stems back to facing the Rockets and their tough defense, but Atlanta is counting on these four players to produce night in and night out and right now, they are not getting it done.
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