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Zach Lowe 10 Things

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8. Taurean Prince, sidesteppin' It seems simple, but this is the kind of skill-within-a-skill that player development coaches drill every day -- a learned movement some players don't feel comfortable using in games until it is so ingrained, they can do it without thinking: Prince has that sidestep 3 down. It is always fascinating to watch how wings who come to the Atlanta Hawks with holes in their games fill those holes. Atlanta prides itself on turning one- or two-dimensional wings into Swiss Army knives who can shoot, pass and dribble -- and choose the correct one of those instantly every time they get the ball. Those are the hardest kinds of players to find. Teams that gather the most survive into May and June. Prince is Atlanta's most important current test case, and it has been refreshing to see him perk up over the past three weeks. He has scored at least 15 points in seven of Atlanta's past nine games, a stretch that has included a 25-point game and a 38-point outburst. He's shooting 50 percent from deep in February, and he's up to 39 percent for the season on a high volume. He fell into some troughs in December and January. Mike Budenholzer even benched him for a couple of extended in-game stretches. Prince's defense is hit-or-miss, and his decision-making with the ball can go haywire. But zoom out, and he's getting better. The Hawks have a ton riding on his future.