Atlanta Hawks Ready to Put Game 1 Behind Them

Publicly, the team is putting on a brave face, despite the beatdown they absorbed from Orlando in the series opener. They tell the AJC that they’re ready to even things up tonight: “It was just one game, but it was an embarrassment. ‘Yeah, it is,’ J.J. said at practice today. ‘But it happens. Put it behind us and move on. ‘They’ll get that chance tomorrow in Game 2. Until then, there are those questions. Do they believe they can beat the Magic in a playoff series when they hardly ever beat them anymore? Can they win at Amway Arena when they keep getting blasted there and aren’t a good road playoff team to begin with? Do they really trust that they have the people and the plan to pull this off? ‘I think we can beat them,’ J.J said. ‘We just have to be poised and take our time on both ends of the court.’ ‘You look at it as a fluke,’ Jamal said. But how can that be when they’ve lost by more than 30 points three of their last four times here? When the Magic has won 7 of their last 8 games against the Hawks? When the Hawks’ offense so often stalls and the defense couldn’t slow neither the Magic’s inside or outside game? ‘If it was a 15-point win, we can kind of be like, ‘Wow, they just beat us,’ Jamal said. “But 40-something points? They are not 40-something points better than us.”’