Hawks narrowly avoid loss against Knicks, Josh Smith birthday

Hawks 98 Knicks 95
30 25 16 24
31 17 26 24

Happy 23rd Josh Smith! We felt this was gonna be a great game with the style the Knicks play and the return of forward Al Harrington against our Al Horford and Josh Smith. The result was not pretty in the first half, Harrington scored 20 pts on 8/12 shooting, but Atlanta was leading 57-55. the Hawks buckled down on defense in the 3rd quarter, but it looked like their offense went with it, holding the Knicks to 16 pts in the 3rd, the Hawks only scored 17. The 4th quarter, the Hawks gave the ball to their 2 best playmakers Josh Smith and Joe Johnson, we are still waiting for Josh to become the great offensive playmaker he can be, especially if he would, i dunno, take 60% of his shots in the paint, he could be an unguardable player at the power forward position, but he scored 16 pts (6/12 FGs 1/5 3pt FGs 3/5 FTs) 8 rbs 5 asts. Joe Johnson scored 17 pts (8/17 FGs 1/7 3pt FGs) 5 rbs 7 asts, and Marvin Williams was the leading scorer of the game with 18 pts (7/14 FGs 0/2 3pt FGs 4/4 FTs) 4 rbs 3 stls.

Its good to see Al Harrington reminice and respect the progress the Hawks made since his departure, he was always a class act for the hawks, he'll be a fine 2-year-rental for the Knicks.

Hawks surely didn't play their best in this win, they know it and they'd better learn from it before facing Dirk Nowitzki in Dallas.

STARTERS	MIN	FGM-A	3PM-A	FTM-A	OREB	DREB	REB	AST	STL	BLK	TO	PF	PTS
Marvin Williams, PF	38	7-14	0-2	4-4	0	4	4	0	3	0	1	1	18
Josh Smith, PF	35	6-12	1-5	3-5	0	8	8	5	0	2	2	3	16
Al Horford, C	29	5-7	0-0	4-5	3	6	9	1	1	0	0	0	14
Joe Johnson, SG	44	8-17	1-7	0-0	0	5	5	7	1	0	6	2	17
Mike Bibby, PG	37	4-14	2-8	0-0	1	5	6	9	1	0	2	0	10
BENCH	MIN	FGM-A	3PM-A	FTM-A	OREB	DREB	REB	AST	STL	BLK	TO	PF	PTS
Maurice Evans, SF	28	5-10	1-4	0-0	2	2	4	0	2	0	2	2	11
Ronald Murray, SG	16	4-6	0-0	2-3	1	3	4	1	0	0	2	1	10
Zaza Pachulia, C	13	0-0	0-0	2-4	0	0	0	0	1	0	2	2	2