- 22 hours ago
Dukes & Bell analyze the Atlanta Hawks' frustrating Game 4 defeat against the New York Knicks, focusing on the team's defensive lapses and offensive inconsistency. They debate Jalen Johnson’s role as the team's primary star and whether he can find the "alpha" mentality needed to compete in the playoffs. The discussion also touches on Jonathan Kuminga's erratic performance and the physical disadvantage the Hawks face.
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00:00it's embarrassing.
00:01You're getting run.
00:02You're getting run.
00:02It's embarrassing.
00:03And you're at home, Mike.
00:05It's not like the energy wasn't there.
00:07Crowd's waiting for you to give us something.
00:10Do something.
00:11And so we've got game five tomorrow.
00:14But, Mike, let's talk about what happened in game four.
00:16I thought we were a little soft on the ball.
00:18Why were we so bad?
00:19I mean, this is a game where the Knicks played like they are supposed to.
00:23They played to their full potential.
00:25They were coached to their full potential.
00:26They executed to their full potential.
00:29Every single possession we had, I said earlier today, it was like root canal.
00:33We couldn't get anything.
00:35I mean, every single basket was challenged by the Knicks.
00:38They played great defense.
00:38And the coach says, you know, I got Carl Anthony Towns.
00:41Let me get the ball to him.
00:42Amazing.
00:42You know, and he goes for two.
00:44It only seemed like more.
00:45It was only 20 points.
00:46You know, Bridges, again, after Knicks fans, he benched him.
00:4919 minutes for him.
00:50Their bench did get 11 points from Myles McBride.
00:52But, again, it was more about, to me, it was about their defense
00:54and our tentative nature.
00:56The refs didn't help.
00:57There were some BS calls.
00:58But, again, when you're not making any shots and you're shooting 24%
01:01Carl from three, you can't, as I said to myself, I can't bellyache about the
01:04refs because they're playing horribly.
01:06They were.
01:07The thing about Towns is he took 10 shots and had 20 points.
01:1120 points, 10 boards, 10 assists.
01:14For those of you who are keeping score, that's a triple-double.
01:17So we talked about him being the most important player, not their best player,
01:21and he showed up in a pivotal Game 4 for them.
01:25And, more importantly, let's talk about us.
01:27Because if this doesn't change, Mike, going into Game 5, we're going to be in trouble coming
01:32home for Game 6.
01:33This is the first.
01:34I mean, look, we said on paper, I said six games.
01:36You and I were discussing.
01:37I said Knicks in six.
01:38There's no shame in that.
01:39But then once you go up 2-1, the tell-tenor of the conversation changes.
01:44And we were stoked about Saturday.
01:45Then you laid an egg.
01:46You came out flat.
01:47I mean, the shot selection.
01:49How many good looks?
01:50I mean, they're not going to be perfect looks in the playoffs.
01:53No.
01:53But I just thought Jalen Johnson's got to take more shots.
01:55He took 12.
01:56He was 4 of 12 from the floor for 14.
01:59He was 1 of 5 from three.
02:01And, again, he'll have a good look and he'll immediately kick it out like hot potato.
02:04You know, Nikhil Alexander-Walker has not given us the great game that we saw down the stretch
02:09to make the playoffs in the first place.
02:1115 is respectable.
02:12He was the one guy that could actually shoot the three.
02:14He was 5 of 10.
02:15But the other thing was we needed Kaminga to be the microwave.
02:17And it never got started.
02:19We never got Kaminga.
02:19So that's the thing.
02:20Can Kaminga be this special force he was in the two wins?
02:24Didn't happen on Saturday.
02:25No.
02:25All you folks kept telling me Kaminga was different.
02:28Looked like the same Kaminga to me.
02:30Well, hey, now, so you're done with Kaminga?
02:32You're done with – you don't want Kaminga to resign?
02:35I'm not done, but this is what we've gotten from him.
02:37But the whole team was crap.
02:38I mean, the whole team was crap on Saturday.
02:40We've gotten a great performance, which is what he gave us in game three.
02:44Right.
02:44And then we get a crap performance in game four.
02:46By the way, bro, stop shooting threes.
02:48That's not your game.
02:490 for 6.
02:50That's not your game.
02:51Okay?
02:52Mike, know your limitations.
02:53Right.
02:54Here's the other part that has to change if we're going to win this series.
02:59Jalen Johnson, you've got to be more impactful.
03:02The points are there.
03:03What if I told you guys Jalen is averaging 19 points over the four games?
03:09You go, well, that's not bad, Dukes.
03:11He's got to be more impactful.
03:13That's what Mike is talking about.
03:15It's not that he's not – shooting, okay, you had a bad shooting night.
03:18You can't – Mike, he was a sieve on defense.
03:22They ate his ass up on game four.
03:25They went at him directly as if he's not tough enough.
03:29Adanobi was getting anything he wanted.
03:32He's not – that's what they said to him.
03:35And look, you guys, this is the truth.
03:37He's not tough enough.
03:38I'm a man.
03:39I called you soft.
03:40And I kept getting texts from people in the league going, your boy, man, what's going on?
03:44They are going at him.
03:46That was the adjustment.
03:48You know what the other adjustment was?
03:49Mike Brown, he did not start him, but he cut Bridges' minutes.
03:53The other guy's got more minutes.
03:56Miles McBride, Jordan Clarkston, and it panned out.
03:59But we got to be more impactful, Mike, in our stars.
04:03Is CJ – does he have to do every damn thing?
04:05It feels like it.
04:06Well, again, he's the one guy that we feel pretty good about with a mid-range jumper.
04:10You know, sometimes – look, he's the one guy that can make off-balance shots.
04:13Sometimes he's going to be better with, like, one foot in the air, it seems like, when he's shooting.
04:16Everybody else, it just seems so – they seem tentative.
04:19You know, Nikhil Alexander-Worker, he was feeling the three-point shot, but nobody else could.
04:23You already talked about, Jalen.
04:25Okongu was out there.
04:26Okongu was kind of a big nothing burger, if we're honest.
04:28Oh, let's see here.
04:29Six boards, 12 points for him.
04:31And he was one of three.
04:32He only took three-point shots.
04:33Three three-point shots.
04:34But you're right.
04:35We don't have the size.
04:36To me, the athleticism and the size of the Knicks, especially in the half-court on defense,
04:39we just can't match that intensity right now.
04:41Well, it didn't affect us.
04:42I thought we would look soft on the ball.
04:43Thanks, Nate.
04:44It didn't affect us, though, Mike, in the game, because we played with emotion and energy.
04:48They came out flat, and the Knicks went, pah, and slapped them.
04:52And then all of a sudden, you're like, well, we can't do this and that.
04:55It was just lame.
04:56Game four was lame.
04:57You're not bringing energy.
04:58We don't have a rep yet with the referees.
05:01But when you look in that flat, the refs aren't going to give you anything anyway.
05:03That's part of the NBA.
05:05So you're fed into it.
05:07And again, the rebounds, we were only out-rebounded by five, by the way.
05:09But it seemed like worse at the time, watching, especially when the league was getting built.
05:13Because you're getting blown out.
05:14It's Dukes and Bell Sports Radio, 92.9, the game.
05:16Got to change.
05:17If he's not more impactful, we're not winning this series.
05:20Sorry.
05:20We're not.
05:21But, Jalen, you and I talked about this.
05:24We never expected to win this series.
05:26At least I didn't.
05:27I did.
05:27I did not.
05:28I said Nixon's six, and I still think it's going to be Nixon's six.
05:31I don't like the way this is gone now.
05:33But we've got to play the perfect game.
05:35We still haven't played.
05:36We won two games.
05:37We're playing basically three quarters.
05:37I think it was game three was three and a half quarters.
05:40We played pretty well.
05:41But still, the size disadvantage, the spacing, we don't have anybody who can match up with
05:45Cat.
05:46We just don't.
05:46No.
05:47When Cat, and again, Mike, what Cat are we getting?
05:50Is he the guy that's going to play, or is he the guy that's going to be roaming around
05:53the three-point line?
05:54I don't know how that goes game in and game out for the Knicks.
05:57If he plays like he did in game four the rest of the way, it's going to be tough.
06:00But I'll also say this.
06:02They took the ball out of CJ's hands.
06:04Other guys got to score, man.
06:05You've got to step up.
06:06They literally took the ball out of CJ McCollum's hands.
06:09Guys, he had nine three-pointers in the first three games.
06:13None.
06:130 for 4.
06:14In game four.
06:16They're taking it out of his...
06:17You're not going to beat us.
06:19Somebody else has got to step up.
06:20Nah and JJ, those are the two guys that are going to have to do it.
06:24And I put more on JJ.
06:25Mike, he led the team in points, rebounds, and assists on the season.
06:29It's why everybody put him in this all-star status category.
06:32And yet we get in the playoffs.
06:34Guess what?
06:34He's not leading the team in any of those categories.
06:37He looked as timid as he did at times in game two.
06:39We talked about...
06:40Where is his head?
06:42This is where the...
06:42We talked about Quinn Snyder pushing the right buttons.
06:45He's got to get him.
06:46He's got to find a way to push that button.
06:48And to get some confidence going.
06:50Because remember how Josh Hart was in his head for much of game two up the Garden?
06:53Now, I will disagree with you on Kaminga.
06:55Because we won two games because of Kaminga.
06:57You know, I mean, we can say that everybody's kind of responsible for the losses.
07:00But Kaminga is a guy that they've got to find a way to get some energy.
07:03He's got to have better shot selection.
07:04I'm with you.
07:05He's more athletic.
07:06His jumper is too inconsistent.
07:07But we also won two games because Kaminga provided energy and a spark for him.
07:10Well, if he doesn't go 0 for 6 in this game and only score 10 points, we might have been
07:14in this one.
07:15Like, that inconsistency, Mike, he has to be the best 6-man in this series.
07:19But Jalen Johnson going for 14 is not going to cut it.
07:21Our best player went for 14 points.
07:23No, but your starters were on the bench halfway through the fourth, too.
07:26You were down 20.
07:27These guys were done.
07:28Jalen played 35 minutes.
07:29I'm just saying.
07:30And Nikhil played 35 as well.
07:31All I'm saying is, Jalen, we have expectations.
07:34We knew this was going to be a learning curve.
07:36Yes.
07:36Well, right now, I hope he's learning something because the results aren't there.
07:38What you got, O?
07:39What you want to add, brother?
07:40You want to hear a fun Kaminga stat?
07:41Uh-oh.
07:42In games, he has scored 10 points or more this year.
07:46The Hawks are 11-1.
07:48Oh, well, all he needed was one more.
07:51I mean, that's an interesting stat.
07:53It was a bad game for our team in game four.
07:56But there were certain things that were targeted and were done that the Knicks hadn't done in this series yet.
08:04And if they feel like, Mike, watching the tape and they go,
08:08pfft, look how soft Jalen is on the ball.
08:10We're going at him.
08:12Look what we're doing.
08:13We take the ball out of C.J. McCollum's hands.
08:16Oh, by the way, let Kaminga shoot those threes because we don't trust.
08:20Like, there are things that they showed in this game that you go, I don't know if that's the formula
08:24in game five, but we got to be better.
08:26And I'm not solely putting it on Kaminga.
08:28What I'm saying is this up and down topsy-turvy thing that we've gone through all season, this is what
08:33I've been talking about.
08:34Now, in a seven-game series, it's hard to imagine how a team can be flat in the playoff atmosphere.
08:37I suppose it was Saturday, the crowd was rocking, but it was a flat.
08:40They were just playing.
08:41We used to play Nate all the time.
08:42We were flat.
08:43That was the Hawks.
08:44Now, I will say this, and a guy just brought this up on Twitter.
08:46You can follow us at Put-Em-UpC-Dukes.
08:48I'm Mike Bell, ATL.
08:49Mike Mixon says, we really miss Jock Landale.
08:51And we do.
08:52Jock Landale.
08:53But we knew that.
08:53But again, that's a guy that can pull a cat away from the basket.
08:56He can pop for the three.
08:58He's physical.
08:59He's really the only guy we have at the center position with any kind of size and toughness.
09:02Sorry, Okagwo.
09:03Yeah.
09:03But O hasn't played bad, man.
09:05I don't think O, double O, has lost this.
09:07He's played better even than I think most people expect, especially shooting the three.
09:11He shot the three fairly well.
09:13What's up, Dede?
09:14No, I was just going to say to your point about Jock Landale, zero offensive rebounds in the first half.
09:19For us.
09:20Right.
09:21Yeah.
09:21You can't win basketball like that.
09:22No.
09:23And that's the 50-50 stuff that Coach was talking about.
09:25Coach Quinn was talking about.
09:26And for those who don't understand, that's a ball that either you or I can get.
09:30It's a 50-50 ball.
09:31Guess what?
09:31You out-hustle me, I get the possession.
09:34Okay?
09:34Now, the Knicks, look, the Knicks had to listen to it for two days in their hotel room.
09:37They came out and they played like they're supposed to.
09:39Mike Brown's hearing he's going to get fired if they don't win the NBA Finals.
09:42So this team came out and did what they're supposed to.
09:44They're better on us than paper.
09:46On paper, they're better.
09:47They've got better athletic players.
09:48They've got a guy that we can't account for in cat.
09:50So, of course, and then when you throw in the effort we threw in, there's your disaster.
09:54Hopefully they won't repeat that up at the Garden tomorrow night.
09:57We'll see.
09:58I think we will respond, but it's not going to be easy just because of the environment.
10:02And winning on the road is tough, man.
10:03It just is.
10:04But I also know, Mike, we know this.
10:06Beating a team twice, two times in a row is also tough, right?
10:08Which is why we shocked them to win two and three, and then they come back in game four.
10:13You win tomorrow night, though.
10:15You've got to close this out Thursday.
10:17Right.
10:17You've got to close this out Thursday.
10:19Look, it's the best two out of three right now.
10:20Yes.
10:20Okay?
10:20You guys, it's pretty simple.
10:22We've shown the ability.
10:23The thing is, in the games they've lost, it's because the Knicks shot themselves in
10:26the foot.
10:26Yeah.
10:26Coaching decisions.
10:27Yeah.
10:27Yeah.
10:28But our best player, and let's take this away from Kaminga, because some of you think
10:31that I'm stuck on that.
10:32I'm not.
10:32I'm just telling you what he is and what you want him to be.
10:36Our best player is not playing up to his capability.
10:40That's Jalen Johnson.
10:41Period.
10:42That's what this is.
10:44If Jalen plays up to his capability and is more impactful and does the things he did
10:48on the regular season where he led the team in points and rebounds and assists, this looks
10:53completely different.
10:54And that is him being aggressive, Mike, not tentative, and also being aggressive defensively.
11:00So if those things happen, this is going to be a competitive game in game five, and then
11:04it probably comes down like it did in two and three.
11:06Look, we've been pumping up and pimping, for lack of a better word, Jalen Johnson for
11:10three years.
11:11And we love his athleticism, but he'll get hurt.
11:14This year, we finally saw him become the all-star.
11:16We said, look, they've moved on.
11:17The ownership says it's not Trey's team, it's Jalen's team.
11:20Yep.
11:20Jalen has got to play like a badass, like a rock star.
11:24Yes, he does.
11:24And he's got to stop.
11:27You cannot.
11:28Look how Brunson, better for worse, Brunson takes over a game.
11:31Jalen's got to find that.
11:32If he doesn't, we're dead.
11:33Period.
11:34He may not be ready for it.
11:36He may not be ready for it.
11:37I don't know.
11:38There was moments where Michael Jordan took beatings in the playoffs on his ascension to
11:42being a superstar.
11:44Everybody goes through it.
11:45I hope he learns something from it, and I hope that Quinn helps to dial something up.
11:49But still, he looks like a guy who doesn't feel like he belongs there right now.
11:53Yeah.
11:53And look, I'm not telling you he is or isn't.
11:55I mean, statistically, you could say for his first big-time playoff experience, he's put
11:59some good numbers up, but we're talking about the big moments.
12:01Yeah, it's just deceiving.
12:03Again, 19 points over four games is not bad.
12:05I mean, that's okay.
12:06First playoff run, that ain't bad.
12:07Give me a 20 a night.
12:09I need more.
12:09He's got to be the alpha.
12:11He's got to be the alpha dog.
12:13Yeah.
12:13All right.
12:13404-726-0929.
12:15You guys can hit us up.
12:16Let us know what you think.
12:18Very disappointing game four.
12:19The effort was crap.
12:21We'll see if they respond coming up tomorrow.
12:25By the way, we've got your coverage.
12:26Yeah, we do.
12:27All week long, okay, Tuesday, pregame and the tip here on Sports Radio 92.9 The Game.
12:33Then on Thursday, we got you as well.
12:35We know we've got a game six.
12:37We just don't know if there'll be a game seven.
12:38If there is, that's back in New York on Saturday.
12:41And, of course, we would have that for you as well.
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