The Atlanta Hawks are looking for their third straight win and owe the Boston Celtics some payback for an earlier loss. The Hawks led the Celtics by 15 points at halftime but were outscored 33-9 in the third quarter. Boston simply dialed up the pressure and Atlanta didn't respond. A despondent Larry Drew talked about the situation:
"The one thing they did was increase the pressure in the second half, which we didn't handle very well," coach Larry Drew said. "We came out and played a really solid first half of basketball and didn't respond to the pressure. We took a lot of ill-advised shots. We did not get into our offense.
A lot of things have changed since then. The Celtics were in the midst of a six-game winning streak at the time. Since then they have lost six straight including last night's 89-86 loss to the New York Knicks. That earlier loss also sent the Hawks into a spiral where they eventually lost eight out of 10 games.