The Hawks are 2 games into their 4-game road trip, facing one of the only other teams in the league that have experienced more lineup inconsistency than Atlanta. Indy has been completely gutted by injuries, particularly in their guard room, as Mathurin and Nembhard have joined Haliburton, McConnell and Jones on the bench. They’ve remained competitive despite lacking any reliable initiation — as Rick Carlisle-led teams tend to do when faced with attrition — with their movement and ball movement potentially stressing the Hawks defense in a similar fashion to how Chicago & Brooklyn found success in the previous 2 games.

Injury Report:

IND: Questionable — Taelon Peter (groin), Johnny Furphy (foot) , Out — Andrew Nembhard (shoulder), Bennedict Mathurin (foot), Obi Toppin (hamstring), Kam Jones (back), T.J. McConnell (hamstring), Tyrese Haliburton (achilles)

ATL: Out — Trae Young (right knee sprain)

Rest Advantages:

IND: 1 day of rest w/ travel, ATL: 1 day of rest w/travel

Projected Starters:

IND: Ben Sheppard, Aaron Nesmith, Jarace Walker, Pascal Siakam, Isaiah Jackson

ATL: Nickeil Alexander-Walker, Dyson Daniels, Zaccharie Risacher, Jalen Johnson, Kristaps Porziņģis

Indiana’s Top 5 Most Played Lineups:

Atlanta’s Top 5 Most Played Lineups:

Atlanta’s Offense vs Indiana’s Defense

Indiana is fouling their opponents at an incredibly high rate, which is usually an indicator of a team’s inability to defend in transition and pass off assignments in the halfcourt. Somehow though, this Pacers team is defending the rim exceptionally well (7th in rim FG% allowed) and rank 3rd in transition defense, holding opponents to a lower PPP off a miss than they do a make.

Look no further than Isaiah Jackson as the culprit behind this conundrum, as he’s been insanely foul-prone, averaging 10.1 fouls per 36 minutes thus far. He’s been getting the short end of the sticks setting screens, while struggling to contain drivers in space, which should be a weakness ATL is attacking all night. Expect NAW to draw a couple offensive fouls when Jackson is screening.

Tony Bradley isn’t far behind either, averaging 7.2 fouls per 36 minutes in his 55 mins to open the season. ATL needs to attack anytime they’re able to get these bigs on an island.

Indiana’s Offense vs Atlanta’s Defense

The Pacers’ offensive numbers are predictably rough, as they’ve had to overextend virtually everyone in their rotation. Pascal Siakam is currently averaging nearly DOUBLE the creation true shot attempts he did last year (7.9, 86th% → 13.3 97th%) and RayJ Dennis is leading IND in On-Ball%.

As a result, they’ve experienced difficulties generating high-quality shots, ranking 28th in Corner 3PA Frequency, 30th in Spot-Up PPP & 28th in Cut PPP. This *should* bode well for the Hawks, as they’ve been relatively solid defending in the halfcourt. More Mo in tonight’s game would be nice, he should be a force against such a handling-deprived roster.

Conversely, Jalen Johnson simply has to be better on defense than he has been to start the season. He’s been a complete negative, with far too many sequences like the one below, absentmindedly losing his assignments with ZERO movement from the offense!

Indy is an extremely high transition frequency team (6th), a scary tendency for a Hawks team that’s been flat-out awful defending fast breaks. They cannot allow Indy’s anemic half-court offense easy buckets considering their opponents will likely find success attacking on the break. This was the most frustrating rep of the entire game, as Jalen allows Cam Thomas to break contain even with the sideline as an extra defender.

Key Action for the Hawks:

This is an extremely simple action that’s equally as effective, especially against teams that play multiple guards. NAW flows into an early offense handoff with Jalen, forcing a switch with JJ at the top of the key. JJ attacks Cam Thomas immediately and gets to one of his easiest buckets all season.

The Verdict

I’m anticipating that the Hawks leave tonight’s game with a 1-0 record in the In-Season Tournament.

Let me know your thoughts on the formatting and information covered in this post! I’m looking to improve this publication in every way as the season goes along.