Do they have anything left?
Do Joe, Josh and the Hawks have anything left? We're going to find out in a few hours.
HAWKSVILLE - The clock is ticking on this once miraculous season for the Hawks.
How much time remains is hard to tell, could be a couple games or a couple days.
No one knows for sure.
But one question about these Hawks remains.
Do they have anything left?
Fresh off two straight blowout loss in Cleveland, it’s all come down to this one showing, tonight’s Game 3 against Cleveland at Philips Arena.
If the Hawks can dig down and find something that works long enough to hold off the Cavaliers, maybe, just perhaps maybe, they can stretch this series out a few days longer.
We all know there have been far too many injuries to contend with for the Hawks to actually dream about springing an upset.
But there is still time to save a little face and make the NBA, the city of Cleveland and even the Cavaliers sweat a little bit.
Win tonight and waking up Sunday morning in a 2-1 hole gives people hope. Go to bed tonight down 3-0, however, and Monday’s Game 4 becomes 48 minutes of survivor. And with LeBron James smelling blood and the Hawks smelling vacation … well, it could be just enough to shove the Hawks all the way over the playoff cliff.
I took a seat in my barber’s chair a little earlier today and before he could even get started, one of his fellow barbers stopped him so he could ask the question that I’ve been getting non-stop the past 48 hours.
“Them boys gettin’ swept or what man?”
I’ll tell you like I told him, it all comes down to tonight.
The Hawks have been holding on to the aura of their own home court advantage, and all the cosmic energy that comes with it, all season long.
It worked for them in Game 7 against Miami. But that was a series clincher. And they weren’t missing three injured starters (only Marvin Williams sat that one out, Al Horford and Joe Johnson did not).
Johnson, Horford and Williams might play tonight (all three are officially “game-time” decisions) and it still might not be enough to hold off the Cavs. They’re that good. And that focused. And that serious about doing whatever it takes, whenever they have to and wherever they have to in an effort to win a championship.
I loved Wally Szczerbiak’s quote after Game 2 when he was asked about the Cavs’ six, double-digit playoff wins this postseason – “You haven’t seen the hard work we’ve been putting in,” he said, insulted that anyone would dare to think the Cavs are just good enough to show up and blow teams away without doing any dirty work to make it happen. “There’s a lot of work that goes into playing as well as we’re playing. We definitely put the effort in on the practice floor, in the film room and in the weight room. We’ve done it all season long, so we are going to continue to do that and it’s paying off during game time.”
This from the team’s seventh, eighth or ninth man, depending on Mike Brown’s playing rotation on a given night. That’s what winning big is all about, that attitude, that mindset and that kind of sacrifice.
And while this looks like hard work from the Hawks’ perspective, James is smiling at the opportunity to play in “another hostile environment” – if an arena filled with fans wearing his jerseys and gasping at his every move, from the powder toss at the start of the game to his headband toss to the crowd at the end, and everything in between, can be considered hostile.
“We have a 2-0 lead,” James said. “A series is never won in two games or three games. But Game 3 is going to be really fun.”
We shall see shortly.
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845 comments Add your comment
CaliHawks
May 9th, 2009
8:56 pm
FINALLY PLAYING SUM GAME..GO HAWKS…!!
Rod from College Park
May 9th, 2009
8:57 pm
Wow,
We start pushing the ball and look what happens. Wish Woodson would have looked at the blog before game 1.
bigdave
May 9th, 2009
8:58 pm
IM TELLING YA… RUN.. RUN..
THEY ARE TOO SLOW AND BIG.. WE CAN’T PLAY THEIR GAME.. PUSH THE TEMPO…
Melvin
May 9th, 2009
8:58 pm
Woody will have to steal some mins to rest Joe and Bibby…
bigdave
May 9th, 2009
9:00 pm
all i need is Stuart Scott to give one of those, “down in the dirty dirty…” and a hawks win..
D.Carter
May 9th, 2009
9:00 pm
I LOVE THE WAY ZA ZA FORCES THE BALL HANDLER OUTSIDE BY GETTING THERE EARLY THUS FORCING THE EXTRA PASS AND BALL ROTATION
bigdave
May 9th, 2009
9:01 pm
Josh, “with the kiss”
Don't Get Your Hopes Up
May 9th, 2009
9:02 pm
Another 2 minute and a couple of Hawks baskets and the refs will take over the game again!
bigdave
May 9th, 2009
9:02 pm
No more Mo coach..
give us ACIE
RJ
May 9th, 2009
9:03 pm
give joe a rest
Don't Get Your Hopes Up
May 9th, 2009
9:04 pm
told ya – they start with ZaZa
bigdave
May 9th, 2009
9:06 pm
why are they beating us to every loose ball??
bigdave
May 9th, 2009
9:07 pm
JIGGA… KILL EM WITH THE FLOW JOE… KILL EM..
Melvin
May 9th, 2009
9:07 pm
Can we get an AND 1 for Joe…
Don't Get Your Hopes Up
May 9th, 2009
9:09 pm
our players won’t get any “AND 1″s – didn’t you notice we play the King and His Holiness’s protege? Prefixed Games!!
D.Carter
May 9th, 2009
9:10 pm
WAY TO ATTACK THE PICK AND ROLL HARD DOUBLE TEAMS MAKE THEM ROTATE THE BALL AND SHOOT JUMPSHOTS.. WHICH CREATE LONG REBOUNDS WHICH CREATES FASTBREAK OPPOURTUNITIES……… NOW MORE PICK AND ROLLS ON OFFENSE
le brown james THE KING OF ATLANTA
May 9th, 2009
9:10 pm
4-0 bring orlando at least the play like mens
RealSquawk
May 9th, 2009
9:12 pm
ditto on the and one. I think the hawks organization needs to make a video comparing his fouls to all the other top players in the league and make it public that they did so
le brown james THE KING OF ATLANTA
May 9th, 2009
9:12 pm
your wnba team is patetic.
Don't Get Your Hopes Up
May 9th, 2009
9:14 pm
oh … and now they can dance the foxtrot as well I guess? The Cav’s I mean, of course
bigdave
May 9th, 2009
9:15 pm
BRING HIM BACK AFTER THE TIMEOUT COACH…
Melvin
May 9th, 2009
9:15 pm
Can we get a AND 1 for Josh….
vava74
May 9th, 2009
9:19 pm
it’s unbelievable the officiating is killing us again! what about calling some defensive fouls on the cavs?!
Don't Get Your Hopes Up
May 9th, 2009
9:21 pm
So they can hit Smith down so the ref’s can call a travel???? told you a couple of lines ago the ref’s would take over!!!
RealSquawk
May 9th, 2009
9:22 pm
please give gardner and law a run at this thing
Melvin
May 9th, 2009
9:22 pm
Woody, I just dont get you. You play Mario West of Acie…
Don't Get Your Hopes Up
May 9th, 2009
9:24 pm
oh – someone dared to breath out in the face of LBJ The KING – Lucky we didn’t get a T
le brown james THE KING OF ATLANTA
May 9th, 2009
9:24 pm
the ref are killing us……… bs is your girls playing soft .
Melvin
May 9th, 2009
9:25 pm
Big Z takes two steps every time he catches the ball and they haven’t call travel on him yet…
RealSquawk
May 9th, 2009
9:26 pm
You know what the scary thing is. The whole world has embraced this guy as the king somebody we are supposed to be witness too. And I think he finally believes and embraces he thinks he is a king and everyone is here to watch him in his greatness
Melvin
May 9th, 2009
9:27 pm
What did Flip shot that from half court when we had 5 secs to get the ball up the floor. My goodness. Only if Woody had sub for Acie, the guy who has the quickness handle on the team….
macaroni tony
May 9th, 2009
9:27 pm
F*** LJ
Don't Get Your Hopes Up
May 9th, 2009
9:27 pm
he makes me puke!!!
Melvin
May 9th, 2009
9:28 pm
Real Squawk, Ditto. And his confidence is thru the roof…
le brown james THE KING OF ATLANTA
May 9th, 2009
9:29 pm
and wait in 2010 when d-wade joint the cavs your sisi team are gona cry every time the face the king and flash.
Melvin
May 9th, 2009
9:31 pm
WoW, Yao out for the Playoffs.
Don't Get Your Hopes Up
May 9th, 2009
9:31 pm
Sekou – are you sitting there somewhere near someone of the owners? If you do, can you please ask them, in the name of the fans, they make official complaints against the officiating for games 2, 3 4 and 6 of the Heat series, and for games 1 thru 3 of current series? And please have ESPN banned to broadcast anymore games the Hawks play!
vava74
May 9th, 2009
9:31 pm
we should make lebron bleed a bit. hit him hard, get Solo and Otello some light and get them to hit him. Anything beyond flagrant 1 should be avoided, but a good hit next time he drives to the basket would slow him down a bit.
vava74
May 9th, 2009
9:32 pm
aren’t we mourning chuck daly? then we should offer them a bit of bad boyz BB
bigdave
May 9th, 2009
9:32 pm
C’mon Magic…
why wouldnt they boo that character… we dont embrace that hoopla, look at me type shyt down here..!!!
that sucka gets no love.. we’ll let yall go crazy for him.. until he dons a ATL uni… F-him…!!!
Don't Get Your Hopes Up
May 9th, 2009
9:33 pm
vava – I agree with most of your comment except: Please get one player out there to make a flagrant 2 and kick him on the ground after that!
RealSquawk
May 9th, 2009
9:34 pm
is that a joke. le brown
CaliHawks
May 9th, 2009
9:34 pm
1ST HALF LOOKED ALOT BETTER THAN THAN THE 1ST 2 GAMES LETS KEEP IT UP … GO HAWKSSSS!!
vava74
May 9th, 2009
9:37 pm
man, jon barry is such a jerk! Dallas was burned by yet another shameful showing of bad officiating… still a consequence of Cuban being too vocal calling all the sh*t that happens bit its name: absolutely SH*T refereeing!
NoleRick
May 9th, 2009
9:38 pm
Yeah its amazing that Josh cant get a foul at all. This guy has gotten his brains beat in the whole game and no call. Still KING JAMES has 1 (one) foul in 10 quarters. I am sure that is not by coincidence.
At least Josh hadnt lost it yet and we are only down by 1. Why is this le brown dude on here? Go listen to some old Bone Thugz in Harmony and shut the f- up.
RealSquawk
May 9th, 2009
9:39 pm
You know i thought the same thing about roughing him up a bit, but the Wizards tried that and it didn’t really work, but i think it is necessary. Especially how he prances around in our building like its cleveland he needs to feel uncomfortable he needs to respect this building.
le brown james THE KING OF ATLANTA
May 9th, 2009
9:43 pm
none of your girls come close to da king
mykhalc
May 9th, 2009
9:43 pm
it just dawned on me…why the HAWKS are bad 1st and 3rd qtr teams!!! they just left the locker-room after listenin’ to WOODSON!! to para-phrase, from the huddle, “good defense. shame we didn’t have any offense”. lord have mercy and heaven forbid they look to you for any!! really hate the cat as a HC!!! if this team had a ‘real, inspirational’ leader they’d really have a decent chance to compete…even on the road. spiritual theme to this post for some reason!!?? guess i’m in prayer!!!LOL
le brown james THE KING OF ATLANTA
May 9th, 2009
9:44 pm
we don’t respect your punk a## building.
Don't Get Your Hopes Up
May 9th, 2009
9:45 pm
Did anyone look at the stats??? Cleveland has “already” 6 fouls committed in the 1st half!!! THAT MUST BE A RECORD!!! They really should get the nomination for World’s Best Fair Play Team!!!! NOT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!