Atlanta Hawks avoid disaster with win over Brooklyn Nets

It certainly wasn’t pretty, but all that really matters to the Atlanta Hawks is that they got the win. Atlanta snapped a three-game losing streak Wednesday night with a 110-105 win over the Brooklyn Nets at Philips Arena.

Atlanta trailed throughout but was finally able to take a lead midway through the third quarter. They opened up a bit in the fourth but once again found themselves having to fight off a Brooklyn rally in the game’s final moments.

“It was a little bit ugly at times, but we needed to win,” Mike Budenholzer told reporters after the game. “I’m proud of guys for finding a way to get it done. A lot of different guys contributed.”

A loss would have been devastating for the Hawks who have a difficult back-to-back coming up against Toronto and Memphis. The Hawks now trail the Raptors by three games in the East standings and are just two up over Indiana.

Dennis Schröder bounced back from his benching on Monday in a big way with a game-high 31 points. Schröder was aggressive from the outset and seemed to pick up where he left off in Monday’s loss to Golden State.

“I thought he was great,” Budenholzer said when asked about Schröder’s performance. “The way he attacks the basket. The way he gets inside. The way he’s shooting the three-ball with so much confidence. He’s just going to keep getting better.”

Schröder reportedly met with Budenholzer following Monday’s benching and also had a long phone conversation with teammate Paul Millsap as well. If there were any lingering effects from the incident they weren’t present on Wednesday.

“It was great. We had a three-game losing streak,” Schröder said of the game. “Everybody did a great job competing for 48 minutes. I’m glad we won the game.”

“I just tried to be aggressive and help the team win. Whatever it takes. I just try to do it. Today it was scoring. They didn’t try to help off Dwight, and he did a great job rolling and collapsing everybody. I took advantage of it.”

Despite the extra attention his on court argument with Dwight Howard and subsequent benching received, Schröder said that he didn’t feel any extra pressure coming into Wednesday’s game.

“Last game happened,” Schröder said. “It’s best that when Coach says something, you have to accept it. And you move forward. We responded well as a team. Now we’re just going to try to keep going forward.”

The Hawks will need to keep it together because they will face another difficult stretch of games next week. Following this weekend’s back-to-back, they will travel to San Antonio on Monday before returning home for a rematch against the Grizzlies.