The Atlanta Hawks just keep showing everyone why they’re pretty good. This time, they did it by taking down the NBA’s second-best team, the Portland Trailblazers, 115-107 on the road.
With the victory, the Hawks have won 18 of their past 20 games and ruined Portland’s nine-game streak with victories over Eastern Conference teams. In addition, Atlanta took a full game lead for the top spot in the East with the Toronto Raptors losing to the Clippers Friday.
Paul MillsapandJeff Teaguewere the key players for the Hawks in this game, with the former scoring a team-high 27 points and the latter scoring 22 of his own.
Millsap shot 11-for-17 from the floor and added six rebounds, while Teague shot 8-for-16 and a perfect 6-for-6 from the free throw line while coming up with two huge buckets late in the game to stop a Portland comeback attempt.
Teague’s play has been phenomenal of late, and the point guard threw in six assists and a pair of steals compared to just one turnover–his first in two games.
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For the Trailblazers,LaMarcus Aldridgeled the way with a game-high 30 points. But the big man also played a game-high 39 minutes and took a game-high 25 shots to do it.
Portland point guardDamian Lillardscored 16 points and had seven assists while shooting 7-of-18.
The Hawks shot 51.2 percent (43-84) from the floor while the Trailblazers shot 45.2 percent (42-93). Atlanta also had several big takeaways and blocks (say hello toDeMarre Carroll, Lillard) that would help the team ice the game. Mike Budenholzer’s team finished the game with five blocks and nine steals–much to the enjoyment of the Hawks’ PR guy:
Portland's a pretty liberal city, and it appears they have a liberal theft policy as well.
— Atlanta Hawks (@ATLHawks)January 4, 2015
The Hawks have been a joy to watch lately, and are much better than
anyone
I expected they would be before the season started. The are currently sitting with the third-best record in the NBA. Remember when people always talked about Budenholzer was bringing a San Antonio Spurs system to ATL? Yeah, well that might actually be happening.
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