Cavaliers-Hawks: Should We Count Out Atlanta Again?

Going into the playoffs in 2008, you heard all the condescending comments: the Hawks were lucky to even be in the playoffs, they were a young team not ready for the next step, the Celtics were an elite team with three dominant players.  All pointed to one glaring prediction.  A sweep.

Even after two games with the Celtics, hometown fans were settled that David could not beat this Goliath.

When the Hawks tied the series and then pushed the eventual champs to a seventh game, the critics said they overachieved.  Journalists got paid for questioning the Hawks' ability to translate that pluck into a successful season the next fall.

The Hawks, however, started strong and fell (that's right, fell) to the fourth seed in the East, a spot they held securely all season.  They've beaten most of the elite teams at least once this year (except for those pesky Celtics) and continually proved themselves superior to teams with worse records.

A banner year, to be sure.  So, going into the first round matchup against the one-man team in the Heat, several commentators predicted a Wade show and a Heat eventual win.  And after Wade dominated one game in Atlanta, even more people jumped on board.

One person commented on my last article that the Heat could win the series "without Wade."  So ridiculous that I couldn't even bring myself to dignify it with a response.

Now that the Hawks proved their superiority over the Heat, we have continual predictions of "sweep!" by the Cavs.

The Hawks, for the second season in a row, are in the enviable position of playing against the best team in the NBA, the heavy favorite to win it all.  Last year they took that team to seven games.  This year...a sweep?

While the Cavs are an amazing team, they are structured more like the Heat than last year's Celtics.  Those Celtics were a better team than this year's Cavs, and probably better coached.

Again, people point to the Hawks' inconsistency, their "youth," the domination of Lebron and the Cavs over the rest of the league (especially the eighth-seeded shell of a team in the Pistons), and the analysts give the Hawks no shot.

I say the Haws' success against the Heat was great practice to take on the Cavs, another one-man team.  The Cavs have a much better team around Lebron than the Heat, and Lebron is a better player than Wade, but the principles are the same: use team defense to contain Lebron as best you can and make the rest of the team beat you.

I also say it took a Game Seven with the Heat before we saw the Hawks play great team basketball and Joe Johnson go off.  I think Joe got royally pissed and finally played with the kind of aggressiveness the team will need.  Will he get on a roll?  He can be as unstoppable as any in the league.

This series could go six...or, dare I say, seven games?

If the Hawks do get swept (a big "if"), they still get to declare a successful season and continue to build and add important role players to a great collection of talent.

But I also see a young, talented, athletic team with nothing to lose and hungry to make some noise.  Just like last year.

The Cavs might want to invest in some ear plugs.

Peace.