SACRAMENTO -- The Hawks rebounded from their loss a night before with a 109-108 win over the Kings at the Golden 1 Center on Monday night.
Here are five observations:
1. The Hawks escaped with a win despite blowing a 16-point lead early in their matchup. They battled back and forth with the Kings before grabbing a four-point lead with just under two minutes to play in the game.
But the Hawks miscommunicated and Trae Young turned the ball over out of bounds, then Garrison Mathews clipped Kings sophomore guard Keon Ellis on a screen, putting the Hawks in the penalty. Ellis made both free throws to cut the lead to 109-108.
Out of a timeout, the Hawks once again misstepped, dribbling out the shot clock before Young found De’Andre Hunter in the corner. But his Hail Mary didn’t fall. Then Dyson Daniels stripped De’Aaron Fox’s attempt at a game-winner to seal the win.
After the buzzer, the Kings’ game operations crew showed the play on the jumbotron and highlighted Daniels’ foot being on the end line as he fell out of bounds with the ball. The officials opted not to review the play.
2. Young scored just seven points but dished out a season-high 19 assists while minimizing his turnovers through the first three quarters. The Hawks guard vowed to make better reads after the loss to the Trail Blazers on Sunday.
It helped that he had plenty of help from his receivers, which Hawks coach Quin Snyder said the team needed to improve on.
Young’s assists netted the Hawks 46 points and they came in the clutch. With 4:42 left, he found Clint Capela with a lob for assist number 18 and that cut the Kings’ lead to one. On assist No. 19, Young found Hunter for a midrange jumper that gave the Hawks the lead for the remainder of the game.
3. The Kings’ explosive shooting began with Ellis getting hot. The 24-year-old hit six 3s in his first 16 minutes of action. His first 3 of the night kicked off a 22-8 run that initially cut the early Hawks’ lead to one by the end of the first quarter.
Ellis’s hot streak continued into the second frame as he helped set the Kings up with a 48-40 lead before he missed his first attempt of the quarter.
He ended the night with a career-high nine 3-pointers, overtaking his previous career-high with 5:00 still to play in the third quarter. He scored a career-high 33 points.
4. While the Hawks couldn’t completely slow down the Kings’ outside shooting, they had some offensive power from Hunter after he returned to the lineup for the second night of back-to-back games.
Hunter picked up where he left off in last Friday’s win, scoring 24 points off the bench with several key jumpers including a baseline midrange jumper that put the Hawks up by a point with 3:47 to play, then a triple at the top of the key that extended the lead to 105-101 just over 20 seconds later.
The Hawks forward looked comfortable, making nine of his 15 shots from the floor.
5. While the Kings had several of their rotation players in DeMar DeRozan, Domantas Sabonis and Malik Monk out, the Hawks saw the return of two of their key players in Bogdan Bogdanovic and Bufkin.
The return of the two guards proved more critical than the Hawks would have imagined before the game after they ruled out forward Jalen Johnson just 15 minutes before tipoff.
Stat to know
19 -- Trae Young dished out the most assists in a game so far this season.
Up next
The Hawks face the Warriors on Wednesday at Chase Arena in San Francisco.
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