"That's the thing about Brandon," said Hawks forward Marvin Williams, who grew up playing with and against Roy in Seattle. "He does what he wants to do when he wants to do it. He's never in a hurry, he's always patient. He's always waiting for somebody else to mess up so he can take advantage of it right there. And that's why he's so effective.
"He's tough to guard and he's very unselfish. He's such a good passer. And that's why he's so tough to guard, and he will be for a long time in this league."
It was the second straight stunning loss to the Blazers for the Hawks, who are 18-22 overall and now 1-2 on their five-game Western Conference road trip, which stops in Phoenix next.
"It's fair to say we're stunned," Hawks coach Mike Woodson said. "This is a game I thought we controlled up until the last four or five minutes of the game. But we had the same kind of slippage late in the Seattle game [Friday night, a 99-90 win in which Atlanta blew most of a 23-point lead].
"As well as we played defense tonight and rebounded the ball, there's no excuse for us to come out of here without winning this game. So we just have to regroup."
"He's become a superstar in the league and one of the top guards in the Western Conference," Smith said. "The only thing you can do with him is slow him down a little bit. But eventually he's going to get on a streak where he's making shots. And he did it late. We wish he'd have done it earlier."
The Hawks tried to hold on late this time but couldn't. Not with Roy slicing through the middle of their defense for layups. And when he wasn't finishing plays at the rim he was finding open shooters in the corners for jump shots that weren't contested until it was already too late.
"We didn't do a good job as a team of defending their isolation plays at the top," said Hawks point guard Anthony Johnson, who finished with 12 points, 11 assists and no turnovers. "We left the guy guarding Brandon Roy out there on an island. And with the way the defensive rules are in this league, you just can't afford to give up layup after layup after layup and expect to win."
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I would really like to see Sekou step outside of his box and stop acting like the majority of Atlanta fans. It's time to stop being so nice! This team deserves to be booed and yet the majority of the city just ignores the fact that they can't finish.
Sekou, how about you write a article about how poor Atlanta is at finishing, and stop worrying about pissing off the players. Your job is secure, it's not like you have any competition at the AJC.
Sugar coat it Sekou, sugar coat it!
