What Knicks game? Hawks no show for 121-105 implosion

Burn the tape.

The Hawks and Knicks linked up for the fifth, yes FIFTH, time this season — a series that includes a big NBA Cup Quarterfinal win in New York to send the Hawks to Las Vegas back in December.

New York was down a number of key contributors, like Jalen Brunson, Miles McBride and Mitchell Robinson, so Atlanta had a chance to continue their push for the seven-seed in the Eastern Conference.

Atlanta got off to a hot start with a triple from Trae Young and a nice baby hook shot from Zaccharie Risacher. Then Young followed it up with his second three in the opening minutes:

New York started pretty hot as well, pouring in 21 points in the first six minutes of the contest. Atlanta’s lax defense was partially to blame, and so they’d need to tighten up very quickly.

Soon, ball security became a big issue, and the Knicks capitalized over and over in transition. Head coach Quin Snyder was forced to stop play at 27-17 to regroup the good guys.

Dyson Daniels did his best to force a rare stop in the first quarter:

The defense ticked up a bit late in the quarter, but the Hawks still found themselves down 38-31 after 12 minutes.

In the second quarter, the Hawks again started in a shaky fashion. New York jumped out to a 12-point lead. Things only snowballed from there, with Atlanta unable to hit absolutely anything and the Knicks capitalization on the other end.

Before you could blink, the Hawks trailed 66-41 with four minutes left in the half, and Atlanta was in danger of being blown out of the building.

By the time the halftime buzzer sounded, the Hawks were down a huge amount, 78-53. This is where I would usually highlight players’ good performances, but there were none in the first half so let’s move on.

The third quarter was…something. Ugly is one word to describe it. A beatdown was another. It vaguely resembled basketball from Atlanta’s side.

Terance Mann and Caris LeVert gave the Hawks a bit of life later in the third quarter, at least. After the lead ballooned to over 30, a couple of nice defensive plays leading to scores brought it back down to 27.

The lead largely held right there until the merciful end to the third quarter, 108-80. This game was virtually cooked well done, and yet we had 12 minutes left to play.

Let’s just skip to the end — the Hawks lost 121-105.

New York shot 15-for-29 (52%) from three off a lot of wide open looks, but really every phase of the Hawks’ performance was well below standard. Flush this one and move onto the Jazz game tomorrow.