INGLEWOOD, Calif. -- The Hawks dropped the second of back-to-back games on Saturday at the Intuit Dome, falling to the Clippers 131-105.
Here are five observations:
1. A big part of the Hawks’ game is running the floor and when they’ve had success it’s because they haven’t shied away from hustling down court. While the Hawks capitalized off of the Clippers’ missed shots in the first half, they seemed less inclined to make up for their mistakes.
The Hawks had 13 turnovers in the first half, allowing the Clippers to score 22 points off of them. The Clippers also looked to take advantage of the Hawks’ slow response to get back, scoring 26 fast-break points, which helped them get out to a 20-point lead by the end of the first half.
“Yeah, it’s difficult,” Hawks guard Dyson Daniels said. ”The way we get our offensive game going and running is get stops in the defensive end, and when we’re giving up 120 plus, 130 a night, we’re not going to get many opportunities to get out and run. So for us, we did become better on the defensive end, so it gives out offense fuel to get out and run.”
The Hawks tried to summon something, opening the second half by running and it led to some success. They opened on a 12-6 run to cut their deficit to 15.
2. The Hawks have wanted to use their defense to spur their offense. But with the defense not clicking, the Hawks needed scoring and guard Trae Young provided it. For the second night in a row, the guard tried to get the team going on the offensive end.
They leaned on him heavily in the first half, playing him 21 minutes. But the Hawks were a -5 with Young on the floor in the first half. But they were a -15 in three minutes without Young.
“I think more of it just consistency of us playing,” Young said. “Like you never know who’s gonna be in and who’s gonna be out. So, that’s part of our problem. I don’t think it’s necessarily X’s and O’s, what coach (Quin Snyder) brings up, or certain things that we do.”
The Hawks’ guard put up a double-double in the first half and finished the night with 20 points and 14 assists.
3. On a night when the Hawks had few things to celebrate, they had a spark from rookie Zaccharie Risacher. The 19-year-old followed his mantra of doing everything he could to try and impact the team in winning ways.
He hustled all over the floor and showed few qualms about diving on the floor for loose balls and sliding out of bounds for them. Risacher did exactly what the Hawks needed, running the floor to get back in transition to try and defend the paint.
Risacher also showed that his ability to finish at the rim has grown. His early instincts of when to attack seemed to return as he hit a couple of finger-roll layups and completed plays through contact.
“I feel like every game is, you know, a new opportunity to learn,” Risacher said. “And that’s really like my mindset right now. I feel like, the more minutes that I can get, the more time I get to learn and, yeah, just trying to play the right way and make sure to help my team for any type of situation.”
4. After a tough outing against the Lakers on Friday night, Hawks forward De’Andre Hunter found the bottom of the net and broke a five-and-half-quarter stretch where he shot just 1-for-17 from the field. Hunter pulled up and buried a triple with 3:15 to play in the first half as the Clippers continued to pull away from the Hawks.
Needing a switch in defensive presence, the Hawks tapped Hunter to open the second half over Vit Krejci, who had started in place of Jalen Johnson (right shoulder soreness).
The Hawks matched up Hunter against Clippers forward Kawhi Leonard, who played his first game since March 31, 2024.
5. Along with elevating Krejci into the rotation in the absence of Johnson, the Hawks tapped Garrison Mathews to give them minutes off the bench in the absence of Bogdan Bogdanovic (left lower leg contusion, injury management).
Mathews gave the Hawks a scoring punch early, making 3-of-4 shots from deep in the first half.
Stat to know
195 -- Trae Young had at least five assists in a game for the 195th consecutive game, the third-longest streak in league history, behind John Stockton (336) and Isiah Thomas 209.
Quotable
“You have to be forceful and really precise against this team.” -- Hawks coach Quin Snyder on the first-half turnovers.
Up next
The Hawks face the Jazz on Tuesday in Salt Lake City.
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