This was NOT pretty...

This was not pretty from the Atlanta Hawks. The Hawks returned home to State Farm Arena to face the Miami Heat tonight. And while their three-point shooting returned in this game, their defense down low in the paint really let them down in this loss. Welcome back to Hawks Digest. My name is Michael Kabrinsky. And as we dive into tonight's video, we're going to be breaking down and recapping the Hawks' 117-129 loss to the Miami Heat. The Heat get their first win of the season. And lately... The Hawks' two losses to the Houston Rockets before this were due to really bad three-point shooting. I highlighted that in my last video yesterday, talking about them. Yekka Okonwu, Jock Landale, Jalen Johnson. Those guys needed to figure it out from three-point land, especially in a Quinn Snyder-led offense. And the Hawks' shooting tonight was pretty good. We'll get into the numbers here in a second, especially from three-point land. The problem tonight was the defense, and specifically the interior defense. Giannis Antetokounmpo, Bam Adebayo really had their way down low. I thought Onyeka Okonwu really struggled in this game defensively, and I even thought the perimeter defense, even Nikhil Alexander-Walker and Dyson Daniels, I didn't think Dyson Daniels was on Giannis, but I don't really think Nikhil had his best defensive night. I thought offensively he was pretty good. But we're going to get into a lot of highlight performances and especially talk a lot about Kingston Flemings in this podcast because he was definitely a bright spot in what's otherwise was the third straight loss for the Atlanta Hawks. But before we get into all the nitty gritty details. of this game i've got to tell you about today's video sponsor and that is going to be our friends over at calci and on calci you're trading directly against other users not like traditional other sports books you're buying yes or no contracts on the outcome of different events across sports politics the weather now's a great time to join calci because you've got the dream in the wmbf finals playing game six tomorrow that tips off at 12 30 and for this video i want to focus on the The Hawks playing at... Playing at 8 p.m. I know it says 7 p.m. there on that graphic, but it's actually going to be at 8 p.m. because the Dream will play at State Farm Arena. It tips off at 12.30. And so the Hawks right now and the Cavaliers, Kalshi has them have an even split, a pick-em basically, 50% chance for both teams here to win tomorrow's game. The injury reports because both teams played tonight. That is not out, obviously. So that will come out. Thank A early to early, early tomorrow. So definitely keep an eye out for any injury updates on this Hawks side. you so But with that being a 50% chance for both teams, much for Kalshi, if you want to join Kalshi and you can, you can trade $25, say yes to the Hawks winning. for joining If they do win, you'll turn those $25 into $47 and 39 cents. And at $25 is a great way to start at Calshi us. because after this video, if you're interested in trying it, you can use the link that you see here on the screen in the, it's going to be in the description and the pin comment use code digest MBA, and you're going to get $55 added to your account instantly when you trade your first $25. So now's a great time to get in on Calshi. And once again, thank you to Calshi for sponsoring today's video. Alright, without further ado, let's get into talking about this game. I want to start off with just the general box score here. For the Atlanta Hawks, I want to highlight some guys here and some individual performances. You've got Nikhil Alexander-Walker and Kingston Flemings both leading the team with 23 points. You had Jalen Johnson leading the team with 11 rebounds and 11 assists. And I think let's get right into Jalen Johnson in this game because, you know, on the surface, especially passing-wise, I thought Jalen Johnson made some great reads in this game, just passing out of double teams and passing out of the times when Giannis Bam, when he really closed out on him defensively. But just scoring-wise, only 12 points tonight for Jalen Johnson, 4 of 12 from the field. And I thought Jalen just really struggled to find clean looks. Now, it was great that Jalen Johnson hit 2 of 4 from deep into this game. We already know that he's been struggling with that three-point shot to start the season. But just overall, downscoring game from Jalen here. And I think offensively, he just was not on the groove tonight. He's been struggling to hit really any shots outside the paint. And tonight, there were some mid-ranges that he took that I don't think were the best shots. And obviously, with Bam down low, with Giannis down low, it makes it tough to finish around the rim. And so for Jalen, I think it was a really off night tonight. You love to see the assist. The passing was obviously there. The nine boards are great. But just scoring wise. Even though the Hawks offense as a whole wasn't, wasn't, was a bad tonight at all. I just think Jalen, they needed a little bit more from him, especially with how bad the defense was for the Hawks tonight as a whole in this contest and defensively with the Hawks. The Hawks allowed 70 points in the paint tonight compared to just 52 points for Atlanta. That is not going to cut it. And on a night where the Hawks recovered their three-point shooting, 16 of 38, if we go back to the box score right here, look, it's a great sign. It's a great sign to see the Hawks shoot 16 of 38. But. But defensively, allowing 129 points, allowing 70 points in the paint, it's just not going to cut it. And Giannis Antetokounmpo, Bam and Abayo, they just were able to dominate down low. So for Jalen, not really enough offensively there. And speaking of those superstars for the Heat, let's go to them now because let's talk about the superstar that Miami went and got this summer, Giannis Antetokounmpo, a monster, monster double-double performance in this game. 24 points. 18 rebounds, 11 of 18 from the field, three assists, stealing a block there for Giannis in 30 minutes. And he got into really bad foul trouble early on in the first quarter. This game picked up two fouls with like eight minutes left in the first quarter. So that was a great start for the Hawks, really putting Giannis and the Heat behind the eight ball there in terms of just his minutes being allowed to play. But Giannis finished the game not in foul trouble and ultimately he just dominated this game inside. The Hawks put through Dyson Daniels on Giannis to try to slow him down. And I thought overall, Dyson did a decent job trying to slow him down. But the biggest thing was just the offensive rebound. In the second quarter, Giannis had four offensive rebounds halfway through the frame. Bam on a bio, who we'll talk about in a minute here, had for his own four offensive rebounds in the third quarter. So both of these guys down low were really, really hurting the Hawks. Thanks, folks. And. For a player like Giannis, he's similar to Shengun in a way that when you allow these guys to get to the nail to the free throw line with one dribble, the possession is pretty much over just because they're so strong, they're so physical, and the Hawks will either have to foul them or just let them get into the paint. And they're going to score. And in this case for Giannis, he was just able to do that a lot tonight. And especially on the boards. Look, the Hawks lost the overall rebounding battle in this game by a lot. If we check the box score here, the Hawks grabbed as a team, they grabbed 40 rebounds. The Heat. As it loads here, I'm pretty sure it's 52. Yeah, 52 to 40. The Hawks lost a rebounding in it. You see there, bam, on a bio, nine rebounds. Giannis, 18 rebounds. You had Bobby Portis with nine rebounds off the bench. Pelé Larson also had a really good game in this game for the Heat. He's a pretty good player. I've liked Pelé Larson, even going back to that draft. And he's turned out to be a pretty good role player in this game. He's kind of like a jack-of-all-trades, master of none. He can kind of affect the game in a lot of different areas. But 17, 6, and 8 for him. So I thought he had a great game off the bench. Tim Hardaway Jr. had his moments, 14 points off the bench. But the rebounding and the paint defense, the interior defense, and also the perimeter defense for the Hawks. I thought Davion Mitchell, Larson, and Tim Hardaway Jr. were getting into the paint too easily. And the perimeter defense is something that the Hawks really hang their hat on. So that's got to be better tomorrow night against the Cleveland Cavaliers. But we already talked about Giannis. And let's get to this guy, Bam Adebayo. If you looked at Bam out of bio's numbers before this game, you would have thought, like, what's going on with this guy? He was averaging 13 points per game coming into this game. And obviously a much, much better performance for Bam tonight against the Hawks. He ended up with 24 points, 9 rebounds, 3 assists, 8 of 16 from the field, 3 steals. And look, when Bam takes 9 free throws, when he's 8 of 16 from the field, 50%, when Giannis is 11 of 18 from the field, But the Hawks did not make their lives tough enough. And how you can see that, they took so many shots in the paint. It was Bam. It was Giannis. And the fact that those guys spent all the time inside that they did, the Hawks were just always going to be behind the eight ball there. So it was really the two superstars here for the Heat that really led them to their first victory of the season. But I want to talk about another guy who really struggled in this game for the Hawks. And that's going to be Onyeka Okonwu. And for Okonwu, I already talked about him briefly in yesterday's video, talking about it's been a rough start to the season. But tonight, look, offensively, I thought he was pretty fine, honestly. Like 11 points, four rebounds, four assists, five attempts on the field, one of three from deep. It's good to see him knock down a three there. But defensively, I definitely thought it was rough from Onyeka tonight. On the boards, I didn't think he did a good job. Even, we've seen him defend Giannis pretty well in the past. Tonight, Quinn Snyder went with Lou Dort and Dyson Daniels on Giannis, and I probably would have liked to see maybe Onyeka do a little bit on Giannis, just to see if he could slow him down a little bit more, but that never ended up being the case, and I thought Giannis and Bam, both of those guys, had a really, really good games. So, overall... We definitely need to see some better performances from Okongwu. I think the offensive production will come, but defensively, it has been a rough start. That is for sure. But look, on a night where there weren't too many bright spots for the Hawks, Two guys that were bright spots for the home team, that is going to be none other than Kingston Flemings and Nikhil Alexander-Walker. And we'll go to Nikhil first because I think Kingston Flemings had the best performance of the night out of anybody in an Atlanta Hawks uniform. Nikhil led the Hawks and Kingston, both of them tied for 23 points, three rebounds, one assist, eight of 18 from the field, five of nine for three, two of two for the free throw line. He added a steal. I thought Nikhil and Kingston were really the only two Hawks on the court tonight. That had an offensive rhythm throughout the majority of the game. I do think there were a couple of shots that Nikhil probably could have passed up on. Maybe should have kicked it out. He got blocked a couple of times. There were a couple of layups that were a little bit wild. But overall, I thought Nikhil played pretty well. It wasn't the best defensive night from him, which is obviously an outlier. Nikhil is a great perimeter defender. So hopefully a bounce back in that regard against Cleveland tomorrow. But overall, Nikhil Alexander-Walker in this game was one of the best players on the floor for the Hawks. I don't want to spend too, too much bearing the lead, which I already did, but I wanted to save Kingston Flemings for last because this was really Kingston Flemings' true breakout performance as a 19-year-old in the NBA. Going to Kingston's performance right now, 23 points, five rebounds, five assists, nine of 12 from the field, three of five from deep, two of three from the free throw line, out of the block, out of the steal. Kingston Flemings was absolutely phenomenal. in this game and obviously he's not going to shoot 9 of 12 every night not going to shoot 3 of 5 from deep every night but coming off of a game where in Houston in that second game it just felt like he was scared to shoot he passed a lot passed up open shots it led to four turnovers for him Tonight was such a breath of fresh air. It just felt like he was hunting his shot, and he still added the playmaking, added the rebounding, five rebounds, five assists, played some pretty good defense, I thought. One of the best perimeter defenders on the team tonight, I thought, was Lou Dort. So, I mean, I'm sorry, it was Kingston Flemings. So I think Kingston, this was really a great sign from him. And, look, Coach Quinn Snyder closed with Kingston Flemings in this game over C.J. McCollum. And the Hawks cut their deficit down. They were once down by 20 in this game. They cut the deficit down to five points in the fourth quarter. But a three from Pella Larson, a couple of dunks from Giannis ultimately ended up closing it out. But for Kingston, great, great performance. Great to see him close the game. And who knows? Maybe Quinn Snyder is going to increase his minutes. Could we get even a starting lineup change in the future of this season if Kingston continues to develop and continues to... Make those progressive steps to playing really well. So this was a great night from Kingston Fleming's both ends of the floor. Great to see a shot go down. And he gets a couple of impressive finishes over Giannis Antetokounmpo. And I'm looking forward to seeing what's next from Kingston Fleming's. But one topic I did want to talk about before we head out of this video is the fact that against bigger teams like the Heat, like the Cavaliers who the Hawks are going to see tomorrow night, is the fact that When you're playing these double big lineups, I don't think Quinn Snyder can afford to play Lou Dort strictly at the floor. I know Asa Newell has struggled defensively over the course of his NBA career and Zuby Ejiofor is only a rookie, but some teams just require that more size down low. And while Lou Dort is a great defender, an absolute strong defender who can guard up, I think defensively on the rebounding specifically, it's been hurting the Hawks the last couple of games. And and I and I'm going to be interesting to see if there's any rotation wrinkles coming, especially if the Hawks continue to deal with that against these bigger teams. So that's that's something I'm going to be looking for in tomorrow's game against Cleveland. But with that, we are going going to go ahead and close out this video. Guys, let me know in the comments below, what did you think of this game? What did you think of Kingston Fleming's performance? And what can you take away from this game going forward? What do the Hawks need to improve? What do you want to see? Love to see your comments on all of that moving forward as the Hawks prepare to take on the Cavaliers in the second half of the back-to-back tomorrow. But with that, we'll get ahead and close it out. Make sure to go ahead and subscribe to Hawks Digest. We appreciate all your guys' support. Don't forget to leave a like on the video as well, and we'll see you in the next one. Peace.