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The Charlotte Hopes to contain Collins, Capela



The Hornets head to Atlanta with a 1-1 record after administering a beatdown to the San Antonio Spurs on Wednesday night to kick off the new season then falling on Friday to the New Orleans Pelicans. The matchup against the Hawks on the road will be a tough one with LaMelo Ball still nursing an ankle injury.

Atlanta Hawks overview
In many ways the Hawks represent what the Hornets wish they were in that Atlanta’s a young-ish, competitive team on the rise. Both the Hornets and the Hawks are building around superstar point guards, but Atlanta has cracked the code of assembling roster depth and quality coaching while Charlotte is still laboring to get there. The result is Atlanta has made the playoffs in each of the last two seasons, including a surprising run to the Eastern Conference Finals two years ago, while the Hornets keep getting bounced in the play-in tournament.

How the Hornets can win
Through two games the Hornets appear to have more bench depth than many anticipated after getting solid play from Nick Richards (12.5 points, 8.0 rebounds per game) and Dennis Smith Jr. (11.0 points, 4.0 assists, 2.5 steals). Gordon Hayward is healthy and has started the season hot averaging 23.0 points and 4.5 assists on a blistering 60% from the field. Nick Richards’ emergence, Dennis Smith’s productivity, and Gordon Hayward’s mere presence make the Hornets a fairly deep, potent team, even without LaMelo Ball.

While containing Trae Young is the easy go-to answer for beating the Hawks, I’m going to highlight the need for the Hornets to clamp down on Atlanta’s big men John Collins and Clint Capela, especially keeping them off the glass. Getting big rebounding games from Mason Plumlee, PJ Washington, and Nick Richards will be key in preventing second chance points from a Hawks team that can score in waves. In the Hornets last game center Jonas Valancinuas annihilated Charlotte in the post with 30 points and 17 boards. The Hornets have to do better down low against the Hawks.

Atlanta has distanced itself from the Hornets in the Eastern Conference standings over the last couple of seasons. We’ll see tonight if the Hornets have made any progress in closing that gap with their Southeast division rival.

Jamaaliver wrote:Ths will be the major flaw all season long for Atlanta. Hawks desperately need AJ Griffin and Bogdan Bogdan to play themselves into game shape ASAP.

D21 wrote:

Jamaaliver wrote:Ths will be the major flaw all season long for Atlanta. Hawks desperately need AJ Griffin and Bogdan Bogdan to play themselves into game shape ASAP.

I prefer that Bogi takes the necessary time, I don't want to see this season players being injured again because of coming back to soon.
Thinking we need both hitting threes ASAP is just showing that Nate is coaching badly:
John and DJ at 38 minutes ? After three games, Murray is averaging 39min/game, Trae and John 36... what is this?
Does he want to injure them?

And in this game, John taking 7 three pts and only 5 two points shots?
The first two games, he took 10 two points shots per game, and 2 and 4 three pts shots