Hawks Humiliate Celts: Atlanta 114- Boston 90

[wfcooper@tiac.com (Bill Cooper)]

	If the score of this game accurately reflected the magnitude
of the beating that the Hawks gave the Celts this afternoon, it would
have to be something like..... 144-12.  The Hawks scored the first 19
points of the game, and the final was only as close as 24, because
Wilkens insisted on keeping his starters in the game long after they
lost interest in the contest.  Antoine Walker sprained his ankle and
had to be helped off the floor halfway through the first quarter (the
score was already 23-2 when it happened).
	In contrast to the two earlier games this year, when the Celts
took the ball to Dikembe Mutumbo and got him into foul trouble early
in the game, the Celts seemed intimidated by him at the start of this
game.  The Celts were thinking to much about how to deal with him and
ended up turning the ball over on their first 4 possessions of the
game.  M.L. called a timeout 2:15 into the game with the C's down 9-0.
He stopped the action again with 3:38 gone (15-0).  Finally with the
score at 19-0, Marty Conlon broke the force field over the C's basket
with a offensive rebound/putback.  From there the Hawks scored another
6 unanswered points to push the lead up to 25-2.  Finally Day and
Conlon got the offense going and combined to score 14 of the Celt's 19
points in the period as the Hawks lead 35-19 after the first.
	To his credit, Wilkins tried not to run up the score and had
his bench in at the start of the second period.  But famous nineteenth
century author Henry James was hot from the perimeter and helped the
Hawks to double the C's score at 51-25.  It just got worse form there
as the Hawks led at the of the half 69-36.  Boos could definitely be
heard as the Celts left the floor.
	For some odd reason Wilkins put his starters back into the
game to start the second half.  They (especially Laettner) were busy
wondering why the refs hadn't invoked the mercy rule, as they only
scored 14 points in the period.  The Celts were barely better, as both
team combined for 7 points over the first 6 minutes of the quarter.
The Celts got their act together first and managed to put to within 24
points at 74-50.    The quarter ended with the Celts trailing 83-56.
	The Celts fell further behind early in the fourth at 87-59.
Behind Fox and Michael Hawkins they went on a 10-2 run to pull within
20 points (the closest they had been since 23-2).  The deep end of the
Hawk's bench responded and pushed the lead back up to 104-73.  Carr
must have told Day that he hadn't been shooting the ball enough,
because Todd started to heave up threes like hotcakes.  Day hit 4
three pointers ion a row, then two foul shots and another three to
score 17 points in about 2 minutes.  All that still left the C's
trailing by 24 at 114-90.
	This game just shows how bad the Celts could be if they didn't
put forth a big effort most nights.  The Celts had 26 turnovers, which
the Hawks converted into 31 points (Hawks had 21 turnovers, but the
C's only got 12 points off of them).   With the advantage in
turnovers, the Hawks took 86 shots to the Celts 82.     And of course,
the Celts shot far worse than the Hawks hitting 31-82 (.378), While
the Hawks shot 45-86(.523).  =20

Lineups- Celts- Wesley, Fox, Williams, Walker, Szabo
                 Hawks- Blaylock, Smith, Corbin, Laettner, Mutumbo

Players- Wesley- David got some rest tonight.  This was as poorly as
Wesley had played since the first few times that Carr started him a
year ago December.  Wesley shot 2-8, had 7 points, 2 boards, 2 assists
and 6 turnovers in 27 minutes.  Mind boggling stuff.

Walker- Only played for 7 minutes before he sprained his ankle.  It's
hard to say how badly his ankle is sprained,  Came down on the back of
the sneaker of one of the hawks, and his ankle just folded over.

Williams- 3-14 shooting for 8 points, 6 boards and 2 turnovers in 38
minutes.  Probably accounted for 2 of Mutumbo's 4 blocks.

=46ox- the only one of the starters who came to play at all.  Scored 11
points in 29 minutes on 4-10 shooting.  Had 5 boards, 3 assists, 3
steals and 3 turnovers.  The 5 C's starters scored 28 points in this
game.

Day- with his 17 point explosion in the last 2 minutes, he scored 33
for the game in 34 minutes. He shot 10-20 (6-10 on threes, 7-8 from
the line).  Also had 7 boards and 2 assists.

Conlon- Marty must be tuckered out tonight.  Played for 37 minutes,
and had 16 points (6-14), 11 boards and 3 assists.   Marty hit Hamer
with a gorgeous behind the back, wrap-around pass in the third
quarter.

Hawkins-  had a rough game in the first half, even though he set a new
career high with 10 assists (I think he had 5 in the last two minutes
of the game feeding Day).  Also played 25 minutes, scored 6 points
himself, and had 4 turnovers.  Tommy H. was commenting that K.C. Jones
thinks that Hawkins has a real future.

Szabo- the Celts seemed to think that they could hit Szabo when
Mutumbo sagged off him. Instead they got 5 turnovers for their
trouble.  Szabo scored 2 points and had 5 boards in 25 minutes.

Hamer- The C's hit him for a couple of easy basket.  Steve scored 6
points and had 4 boards in 17 minutes.

Coaching- Szabo in the opening lineup really hurt the Celts tonight,
as he couldn't do anything with the ball when Mutumbo sagged off him
and the Celts wouldn't put him above the three point line and try to
use the Illegal Defense rule.  Earlier in the season, when the Celts
did a better job against the Hawks, Day started and the Hawks tried to
play Mutumbo on Williams.  Eric got Mutumbo in foul trouble early,
though the Hawks eventually won anyway.  As soon as Walker got hurt
that option was gone.

The Celts record in now 12-50.  They get a chance to extend the
Chicago Bulls losing streak this Tuesday in Boston.

Bill Cooper
wfcooper@tiac.com=20


=20
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