So much time has passed since the Hawks have played together, they were thrilled to go through a simple layup drill on the first day of minicamp team practices.
“We’ve never done a layup drill with such intensity,” coach Lloyd Pierce said Wednesday. “We did a full-court layup drill, and the guys were clapping and cheering. So it goes to show we haven’t practiced in a long time if they’re excited about doing layup drills.”
It’s been a little more than six months since the Hawks played what ended up being their final game of the 2019 season March 11, so the team is understandably excited to reunite in person. Individual workouts have been allowed at the practice facility since May, but the next two weeks of camp (which involves a group of about 40 or so people, including players and staff, going back and forth between a hotel and the practice facility) will be the only team activity allowed for the eight teams not included in the Orlando restart.
For Clint Capela, who hasn’t played a game since January, the lull dates back even further — that’s what made Wednesday’s practice so odd, and so welcome, for the 26-year-old.
“It honestly felt a little bit weird at the beginning, being on drills with everybody, cheering, everybody just being with everybody and being involved,” Capela said. “It honestly felt really great. It felt good going through drills, being vocal. I couldn’t wait. It’s been a very, very long time. So I’m really enjoying it right now.”
After the Hawks acquired him from the Rockets at the trade deadline last season, Capela was an active member in the locker room, but a nagging heel injury prevented him from making his debut or practicing full-on with his new teammates. The Hawks officially classified it as a “right calcaneus contusion/plantar fasciitis,” and though he was feeling much improved in June, he couldn’t do much more than work out by himself.
Wednesday’s practice wasn’t too strenuous, with Pierce deciding not to run any full-court 5-on-5 in an attempt to ease players back into the swing of things and hopefully avoid injury (but they did play half-court 5-on-5). However, a fully-healthy Capela said he has no limitations on his activity, other than this marking his first-team practice in quite some time.
He had been regularly coming into the practice facility on weekdays to lift weights and work out individually, and worked with trainers to strengthen his right leg so he can put less pressure on his heel.
“I keep getting stronger in that heel area with the trainers, and the goal is to get even stronger so I’ll be able to put less stress on it,” Capela said.
Even though he’s excited to be practicing again, there’s a limited amount of basketball-centric goals that can be achieved in two weeks. So, for minicamp, Capela is focusing on getting to know his teammates better.
He has been talking on the phone and FaceTiming with Trae Young and John Collins, and chatting with Kevin Huerter, but this camp gives him an in-person opportunity to hang out with other guys, too.
“So we can get to know each other better, and it will definitely help on the court,” Capela said. “Because this is what you want with your teammates, you want us to get close enough to be like brothers, so whenever we’re on the court we’re able to give everything for each other and care more for each other. That’s the goal here.”
That coincides with the larger team goal for minicamp, and a focus of Pierce’s: building team chemistry and developing relationships.
“Having Clint here is extremely important from a connection standpoint,” Pierce said. “Forget the basketball; we get to know what he’s like on the court, we get to hear his voice, and we also get to hang out with him off the court.”
Pierce was impressed by what he saw from Capela in Wednesday’s practice, even though they did no pick-and-roll work, which is Capela’s specialty.
Moving forward, Pierce will try to figure out Capela’s strengths and how they can play to them. But in this short window, his rebounding expertise, which the Hawks sorely missed last season, already was on display.
“We’ve seen Clint, he’s been in good shape, he’s been moving well for a couple months, a couple weeks now,” Pierce said. “He was fine. You see some of the subtle things that you don’t have to worry about. He had a great box-out today. Defensive rebounding was a big issue for us, and he just knows how to do it. He knows how to hold off one guy with one arm and go get it with the other. … He showed a couple of those positions where instantly you look down there and you’re like, ‘We’ll be all right there.’”
The other thing that already stands out to Pierce is Capela’s mindset on defense and his vocal leadership (another thing the Hawks desperately needed last season).
While working with Pierce in an individual session a few weeks ago, Capela asked Pierce about a defensive scenario and what coverage would work best.
“The next thing you know, 40 minutes later, we’ve gone over about five or six different scenarios on the defensive end, talking about how can we defend this, or what should we do and one thing that he does a tremendous job (with) is say, ‘Hey, the biggest thing you can do is just talk,'" Pierce said. "And honor the talk. And I think that’s the absolute truth.
"It isn’t schemes. … You can have the greatest schemes in the world and take it to a different team and those schemes don’t work. It really isn’t the schemes, it’s the effort, it’s the commitment, it’s the ability to work as a unit. And I love the fact that he really is empowering the voice more so than the coverage, and that’s going to be tremendous for us moving forward.”
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