Hawks win, but not in same rhythm as regular season
ATLANTA – There was a moment Sunday evening, as Al Horford's right pinky bent at an angle fingers are not supposed to bend and he made an immediate exit from the Philips Arena floor to the locker room, that a month's worth of nervousness about the physical state of the Atlanta Hawks was reaching worst-case scenario status.
While Horford was getting his dislocated finger X-rayed and taped up early in the fourth quarter, Atlanta's other frontcourt cornerstone Paul Millsap was laboring through one of his worst games of the season, the culmination of disrupted rhythm and right shoulder discomfort that traces back to an April 4 injury.
Though Horford would ultimately return and the Hawks held on to beat the Brooklyn Nets, 99-92, in their playoff opener as the Eastern Conference's No. 1 seed, it is legitimate to wonder whether the team Atlanta will have going forward is going to really resemble the one that won 19 consecutive games in the middle of the season and once seemed destined for an NBA Finals run.
"It's the playoffs. We have to win all type of ways," said Millsap, who made 2-of-11 from the field and did not look much like the All-Star power forward he has been since signing with Atlanta in 2013. "You never know how you have to win a game. Tonight we've shown we can win it ugly."
Unless something else happens between now and Wednesday's Game 2, the Hawks will have their full lineup minus small forward Thabo Sefolosha, who is out for the season because of significant leg injuries sustained in an incident with police officers outside a New York nightclub on April 8. Horford, who returned to Sunday's game later in the fourth quarter after, will play. Millsap will continue to adjust to playing with a compression shirt, which has limited his range of motion.
So while the Hawks essentially have their full complement of players, the question is if they are now a diminished version of themselves given how reliant their system is on both players' ability to score from the perimeter, creating space for drivers and cutters.
Millsap, who shot 47.6% for the season and 35.6% from the 3-point line, missed several shots he makes with regularity, including a handful within 10 feet of the basket where he has been so dangerous this season.
Only once, when he was isolated on Joe Johnson and then slithered through the help defender for a bucket in the third quarter, did Millsap really look like himself making an aggressive offensive move.
"There's no concern about Paul and his shoulder," Atlanta coach Mike Budenholzer said. "I think he impacts the game so many different ways, and I know he probably doesn't have very many games like that but it happens to everybody. I think his activity, his hands, steals, decision-making, rebounding (were good). Unless he's hiding something, I think Paul is fine."
Millsap acknowledged he was a bit disappointed in his performance, particularly after a sharp practice on Saturday that he thought would propel him to a fast start in the playoffs. After missing five games, however, and playing just 27 minutes in the regular season finale against Chicago (he went 2-for-9 in that game), it's clear there's still some rust.
But is that all it is?
"The shoulder is probably going to be a nagging thing but I feel like I can work my way back into myself. I had a lot of looks tonight that normally fall," Millsap said. "Mobility with the shirt (is an issue). It's still sore at times but it's manageable. The mobility is what has to get better, and if not, I have to learn how to adjust, man. Can't make any excuses. This is playoff basketball."
Horford, meanwhile, was thankful that X-rays on his finger came back negative, which was a especially a relief given his injury luck. Horford played 11 games in 2011-12 and 29 last season because of torn pectoral muscles.
Without Horford, the Hawks made the playoffs anyway a year ago but were nothing more than a feel-good story as the No. 8 seed that pushed Indiana to the brink in the first round. This time, they have set their sights higher and with good reason given how they performed in the regular season.
But the margins were always going to be thin for the Hawks, and the thing they can least afford to lose is the quality that makes them so unique and difficult to guard. If Horford and Millsap aren't playing well – or at all – this is unlikely to end the way they once envisioned.
And given that Atlanta essentially spent the last month of the season resting its starters in hopes of entering the playoffs in peak physical form, having these concerns this one game into the first series isn't ideal.
"I'll be fine," said Horford, who said it was unclear exactly how the injury occurred after he came up with a rebound.
Though he came back into the game at a key time with 5:52 remaining – Atlanta's 14-point lead had just been cut in half – he wasn't a huge factor on offense and badly missed a mid-range jumper. He admitted that the tape on his fingers, which was readjusted once during a timeout, was a factor.
"It definitely affected me, especially on my shooting hand, it was very uncomfortable for me to shoot the ball," he said. "So the next couple days in practice I'll have to start shooting like that and get used to it."
Atlanta never expected to roll through the Eastern Conference playoffs the way it did in the regular season, but it appears this turbulent start to the postseason is going to force its best players to make some key adjustments. A team that spent nearly four straight months in such a smooth rhythm is suddenly trying to get it back.
"There are a lot of nights where guys don't shoot the ball well or don't play as well as they'd like to," said guard Kyle Korver, who scored 21 points and made 5-of-11 from the 3-point line. "The reality is that Paul is probably finding his rhythm a little bit and he will. We just keep working on our system move the ball, play with the pass, play with space, play with pace and keep on finding someone else."