Atlanta Hawks bench carries team to dominating 116 – 84 win over Detroit Pistons – NBA Recap
The Atlanta Hawks dominated proceedings on Wednesday from start to finish against the Detroit Pistons for a resounding 116 – 84 win. The Hawks wowed the Philips Arena crowd with a storming display, especially from the bench players who outperformed even
the Detroit starters.
Atlanta had 12 points and 9 rebounds from Josh Smith while Joe Johnson tallied 13 points. The damage though was done by the reserves.
Atlanta’s subs combined for a whopping 72 points, a season high. Veteran Tracy McGrady had a team high 17 points, Ivan Johnson had 16 while Marvin Williams and Willie Green both scored 10 points each.
"We provide a different kind of spark with the guys we have coming off the bench. Some of those guys could be starters on other teams." McGrady said after the game, applauding the performance from reserves.
"We ask a lot of those guys," Green said of the Hawks starters. "When we come in the game, it's up to us to continue their level of play or even pick it up a notch."
"We were two different teams," Detroit's Walker Russell said, referring to the Pistons strong display just the previous night. "I don't want to blame the back-to-back because we're supposed to come out and be competitive every night. But sometimes it just
happens. They came out and really put it to us."
Russell had 15 points in the game; he was one of only three Detroit players to cross into double figures. Charlie Villanueva had 14 while Greg Monroe collected the team high 17 points.
Atlanta jumped on the visitors’ right from the start, a 16 – 5 sprint putting them in a strong position at the beginning. The Hawks maintained their advantage with minimum effort and then had 10 – 0 burst just before the end of the segment that broke the
Pistons’ back, taking the score to 37 – 18 before it ended at 39 – 20.
The huge advantage though didn’t mean that the Hawks would take their foot off the pedal. They continued to press on in the second period, piling on 33 points. The hapless Pistons could only manage 22 in reply, which meant that at halftime they were staring
at a huge 30 point disadvantage; 72 – 42.
Pistons misery continued after the break. Detroit looked to their bench for some help as the starters looked completely deflated. They stopped the rot, so to speak, but weren’t able to make any inroads at all, with the Hawks adding a little more to their
lead before the third frame ended at 96 – 61.
The final period was thus just a formality which ended with the score at 116 – 84.
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