What's the Ceiling for Hot Atlanta Hawks?
With 12 wins in their last 13 games, the Atlanta Hawks are the NBA's hottest team.
The squad boasts a league-leading point differential of plus-12.5 over its last 10 contests, according to ESPN’s Hollinger Power Rankings. The Golden State Warriors are a distant second at plus-8.5.
But is Atlanta a legitimate title contender? It’s a question that deserves asking, considering the Hawks haven’t made the Eastern Conference Finals since joining the conference in 1970.
To determine Atlanta's ceiling, we'll look at how it's playing now, what it can do to improve and, ultimately, how well it can realistically finish the season.
What’s Causing The Hawks’ Success This Year?
The Hawks are 19-7 and sit comfortably in the East’s No. 2 slot so far this season.
How did they climb that high, especially after going just 38-44 and barely sneaking into the playoffs in 2013-14? Three reasons stand out.
Teamwork
Atlanta ranks No. 1 in the NBA in both assists per game (25.8) and assist ratio (19.8), per ESPN.com. The team was also second in both categories last year.
In case you hadn't noticed, passing is very important to the Hawks.
Point guard Jeff Teague leads the team in scoring (16.8 points per game), but he ranks just No. 31 in the league in that category. Power forward Paul Millsap paces Atlanta in rebounding (7.8), yet 26 players are cleaning the class better than he is on a per-game basis.
So far, the team has banded together to form something greater than the sum of its parts.
One game, a three-point barrage from shooting guard Kyle Korver could swing the game. In another, it might be backup point guard Dennis Schroder’s forays into the paint. And in others, it could be center Al Horford’s (who’s back from his season-ending pectoral injury last season) automatic touch from mid-range.
The Hawks’ teamwork is also showing up on defense. Despite lacking an elite individual defender in the starting lineup (small forward DeMarre Carroll is the closest thing), Atlanta’s 102.9 defensive rating is No. 7 in the NBA.
After last Wednesday’s 127-98 drubbing of the Cleveland Cavaliers, head coach Mike Budenholzer perfectly summed up the Hawks’ success so far this season. He said the following, according to The Associated Press, via ABC News: “You go up and down the roster, different guys contributing at different times. That's what we're trying to build, is a team.”
Familiarity With the System
Budenholzer is in his second year leading the Hawks after serving 17 years as an assistant coach to Gregg Popovich for the San Antonio Spurs. Coach Bud won four championships as a part of the successful San Antonio organization.
Many may scoff at the Hawks’ efforts to become “Spurs East,” but they’ve actually done a lot of things right in the last couple of years. Let’s go through a quick checklist:
Hire Popovich’s top assistant and confidant? Check.
Install the Spurs’ offensive system? Check.
Emphasize internal player development rather than acquisition of big-name players? Check.
That last point about internal development has been big for the Hawks to start the 2014-15 campaign. Atlanta returned 12 members from last year’s squad who combined to post a player efficiency rating of 161.8 in 2013-14. Meanwhile, those same players are now posting an aggregate PER of 192 this season. The infographic linked here shows each player’s progression.
Both the statistics and standings support that the returning Hawks have shown increased comfort in Budenholzer’s system.
Favorable Scheduling
Atlanta’s strength of schedule rating (minus-1.49) is the worst in the league right now. This measure takes into account how many home and away games a team plays, as well as the quality of opponents.
So essentially, the Hawks have played the NBA’s easiest slate of contests so far.
Between Nov. 26 and Dec. 12, the team played just one opponent above .500 (the 14-13 New Orleans Pelicans). The result? Nine straight wins, which ballooned the team’s record from a mediocre 7-6 to an excellent 16-6.
In the past week, the Hawks have signature wins against the Chicago Bulls, Cleveland Cavaliers and Houston Rockets, which indicates that they may have what it takes to consistently contend with the NBA’s upper-echelon teams.
The Hawks are a very good team. But, at least record-wise, their early-season success has been slightly inflated by an easy schedule.
Where Can the Hawks Improve?
The biggest issue for Atlanta right now is its inability to control the boards. The Hawks are the NBA’s No. 25 team in rebounding differential (minus-2.5), and all five teams below them are .500 or worse, except for the 15-14 Phoenix Suns. Millsap is 6’8” and Horford is 6’10”, which is definitely on the small side for an inside duo.
Barring a trade for more size or athleticism on the interior, Atlanta's problems cleaning the glass will persist.
Aside from rebounding, the Hawks haven’t left tons of room for improvement. The players are meshing well together on both ends, although Horford is still shaking off some rust from his season-ending pectoral injury in 2013.
Injuries also haven’t troubled the Hawks very much, unlike some of their Eastern Conference competition. Teague has missed only two games, which somehow led to road wins over the Cavaliers and Rockets. But overall, none of Atlanta’s rotation players have been out with an injury for more than five games.
Unfortunately, other teams in the Eastern Conference have more areas in which they can get better as the season progresses.
The No. 1-seeded Toronto Raptors have played the last 11 games without their star shooting guard, DeMar DeRozan, who is out with a groin injury. With DeRozan, they posted a gaudy 13-3 record.
The Chicago Bulls, currently the No. 5 seed, have dealt with significant injuries to key rotation players Derrick Rose, Joakim Noah and Taj Gibson.
On-court chemistry issues are still plaguing the inconsistent, No. 4-seeded Cleveland Cavaliers. But if LeBron James, Kevin Love and Kyrie Irving learn to accommodate each other’s skill sets and improve even a little bit on defense, they may have too much firepower for anyone in the East to handle.
What’s the Hawks’ Ceiling?
Right now, the Hawks are one of five Eastern Conference teams capable of reaching the NBA Finals, along with the Raptors, Washington Wizards, Bulls and Cavaliers.
Atlanta is one of the longer shots, considering its combination of a lack of star power, minimal experience with deep playoff runs and serious rebounding problems. Consider the Bulls and Cavaliers the conference favorites for now.
But if both the Bulls and Cavaliers struggle to deliver on their potential, the Hawks are right there with the Raptors and Wizards as teams that could sneak into the Finals.
Contending for a championship without a true superstar is hard, but it’s possible with near-perfect teamwork and coaching, as the 2003-04 Detroit Pistons showed us. The Hawks are well on their way to that, but they may need a year more under Budenholzer’s system to become a legitimate league powerhouse.
Ceiling: 57-25, No. 2 in East, NBA Finals appearance
Floor: 45-37, No. 6 in East, first-round exit
Prediction: 53-29, No. 4 in Eastern Conference, second-round exit
Note: All statistics are from Basketball-Reference.com and updated through Dec. 21 unless otherwise indicated.
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