Takeaways from the Hawks stumble in Orlando

1. Try as they might, the Hawks could not find a way around the Magic’s physicality. The Magic got into the Hawks’ bodies, using their hands to disrupt plays early and forcing early turnovers. They had seven turnovers in the first quarter, finishing the night with 18.

The Hawks tried to match. With 3:31 in the first quarter, Hawks forward Terance Mann held on to the after falling to the ground and Wendell Carter jumped to try to grab the ball. After initially losing the jump ball, Mann grabbed the ball from Carter and forced another jump ball. Mann won the second jump ball and the Hawks got a 3 from Onyeka Okongwu out of it to cut their deficit to 20-18 with just over three minutes to play in the first.

They continued their attempts to play through the Magic’s aggressive defense, but officials did not seem to see some of it. With 4:32 to play in the game, Okongwu caught a lob from Hawks guard Trae Young that Carter broke up at the rim. On replay, Carter got a piece of Okongwu’s arm and the Hawks center tried to argue his case and earned a technical foul instead.

Okongwu’s dunk attempt could have cut the Hawks’ deficit to six, but the Magic stretched their lead to nine.

2. The Hawks tried to set the tone early in the game, picking off the Magic on back-to-back plays in the first 44 seconds of the game. It allowed them to get out to an early 6-0 lead.

But their eagerness got them into early foul trouble. They picked up nine fouls in the first 13 minutes, including three each on Young and Mouhamed Gueye. Hawks rookie Zaccharie Risacher had two fouls in that time, with Caris LeVert picking up the team’s ninth.

The Hawks ended up sending the Magic to the line 20 times in the first half. While the Magic made just seven of them.

3. Defending the 3 has been a weak point for the Hawks this season and the Magic capitalized. Entering the night, the Magic made just over 31% of their 3-point attempts. But they shot well above their average.

Kentavious Caldwell-Pope, who has shot the ball well lately, made 50% of his attempts from deep. If he was not knocking down shots, he was finding his teammates for daggers.

4. The Magic looked to get the ball out of Young’s hands as much as possible, which led to early doubles and traps. So, the Hawks countered by finding some of their bigs like Okongwu quickly, which led to some early success.

Okongwu scored 13 points by the end of the first half, making 50% of his overall shots. However, all but one of those early makes came from deep after the center rotated out to the perimeter to try to open up the lane.

In the second half, though, Okongwu attacked the rim. When the Magic tried to slow him down, he earned trips to the line. The center tied his career high in a regular-season game, scoring 30 points, grabbing 14 rebounds, dishing four assists and finishing with three steals.

As the Hawks make the push into the postseason, the fifth-year big man continues to give the team a viable option to play through.

5. Though the Hawks fell to the Magic, they maintained their hold on the eighth seed due to the Bulls dropping their contest to the Cavaliers. The Hawks still have a one-game hold on the eighth seed and if the regular season ended today, they would return to Orlando to face the Magic in the Play-In game between the seventh and eighth seeds.