Hawks flying high again take 3–2 series lead

Atlanta Hawks dom­i­nated the Miami Heat Wednes­day night tak­ing a 3–2 lead in the East­ern Con­fer­ence Semi­fi­nal Play­offs. Rebound­ing and bench play once again dic­tated the win­ner as the Hawks out rebounded the Heat 37–29.

It was a bruis­ing game as Al Hor­ford fell hard and left the game early after twist­ing his ankle. Dwayne Wade also fell hard and left the game tem­porar­ily after slam­ming the back of his head on the floor. Jer­maine O’Neal went down after tak­ing a left elbow to his face late in the third period.

Dwayne Wade came out on fire after the half scor­ing 17 points in the third period, but Atlanta was up to the task and answered with a thun­der­ous dunk by Josh Smith and some solid play from Flip Mur­ray who had a series high 23 points. Joe John­son regained his swag­ger as he had his best game of the series by far putting down 25 points.

Atlanta Hawks will face a bur­den in game six at Miami with Mar­vin Williams out due to a wrist injury and Al Hor­ford likely out with a mod­er­ate ankle sprain. Mean­while, the Heat will have to over­come not only Jer­maine O’Neal’s ankle prob­lem and Dwayne Wade’s back spasms, but another humil­i­at­ing and size-able defeat. The Hawks will be try­ing to win their first play­off series since 1994.

Hawks Take Home-Court Advantage

In a phys­i­cal bat­tle, the Atlanta Hawks grab a vic­tory on the Miami Heat’s home court to tie the series at two a piece. It was a sur­pris­ing win as the Hawk’s won their first road play­off game in over 11 years.

Miami’s bench was outscored 25–2 and their offense was held to less than 30 points in the sec­ond half. Zaza Pachu­lia had a solid game with 12 points and 18 rebounds as he out-battled Miami’s cen­ter Jer­maine O’Neal.

Ronald Mur­ray pro­vided the spark off the bench, while Josh Smith pro­vided the tough­ness down the stretch. Mike Bibby led the Hawks with 15 points and Joe John­son added 14 more. Dwayne Wade has held to just 22 points the entire game.

The Atlanta Hawks had to bring their phys­i­cal game to win this one and that’s just what they did. After the game, many of the Hawks looked bat­tered and bruised. Zsa Zsa looked like Rock Bal­boa after a 15 round fight with Apollo Creed. Joe John­son had his foot in a bucket of ice and Josh Smith had sev­eral abra­sions on his face.

Game 5 is going back to Philips Arena in Atlanta for Wednes­day nights game at 8:00pm. Go Hawks!

Falcons steal All-Pro Tony Gonzalez

In another bril­liant move by Thomas Dim­itroff, the Atlanta Fal­cons acquire All Pro Tony Gon­za­lez. The record 10-time All Pro tight end Gon­za­lez was traded Thurs­day from Kansas City to Atlanta for a 2010 sec­ond round draft pick.

This is such a sen­sa­tional move that it puts Atlanta Fal­cons right there with the New Orleans Saints as the most explo­sive offenses in the league. Matt Ryan can only ben­e­fit from one of the most pro­lific red zone tight ends ever to play in the NFL. Adding to that offense is Roddy White, Harry Dou­glas, and Michael Turner.

Last year Atlanta’s GM Dim­itroff made what proved to be one of the best moves in league by snag­ging free agent Michael Turner from San Diego. Michael Turner In addi­tion, Dim­itroff gam­bled when he drafted rookie sen­sa­tion Matt Ryan.

There has been no fall off in pro­duc­tion for the 33 year old. In 2007, Tony grabbed 96 recep­tions for over 1,000 yards and 10 TD’s. Gon­za­lez stated yes­ter­day, “I’m here for one rea­son, and that’s to win a super bowl”. Tony has yet to win a play­off game in his long dis­tin­guished but hopes that will turn around now that he’s a Falcon.

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