Atlanta Hawks

The final score cast the matchup about right. The process to get to the Hawks' 121-98 win over the New Orleans Hornets on Saturday night at Philips Arena didn't necessarily follow convention.

The Hawks didn't have a lot to go on in preparing for a New Orleans team playing without its star point guard and a new coach.

Hawks coach Mike Woodson pulled the right strings this week. Before the team’s trip to New York, Woodson spent practice time focusing on team defense, particularly improving communication on switches.

Okay, here’s your game blog, folks.

Nothing too significant from pre-game stuff that I heard. Sorry I can’t write more; I gotta crank out some stuff before tipoff.

Any predictions?

BOSTON - Only by a half-game over Miami, but pretty strange, I bet, for some of you to read. I’m at Logan, waiting for a 7 a.m. flight back home. While I’ve got a few minutes, I figured I’d dump a few more quotes on you and look ahead. The big news is that Chris Paul won’t be in the lineup, out with a sprained ankle sustained Friday against Portland in new coach Jeff Bower’s debut. That obviously tilts the balance a bit in the Hawks’ direction.

Some links: Boston Globe story on http://www.boston.com/sports/basketball/celtics/articles/2009/11/14/atlantas_growth_spurt_was_the_biggest_factor/; Boston Herald game story.

My http://www.ajc.com/sports/atlanta-hawks/with-huge-rebounding-night-197066.htmlfiled after the print deadline.

From the locker rooms at the TD Garden: Kevin Garnett: “They draw one on ones a lot, a lot of isolation basketball. Jamal Crawford and Joe Johnson are two of the best at that. I thought team-wise, they spread us out and they did a good job. Kudos to …

Good afternoon, all-

Thanks for your patience. I kind of ended up taking the long way back from the arena because I had to run an errand, and then lunch, then transcribing and now the blog.

Some Mike Woodson material: He thinks the Celtics are the best team in the league, better than they were two years ago when they won the title.

The psyche question – “The Lakers, they’re the champs until somebody takes it from them. But I think this team has got a legitimate chance to win. To come in here and try to win a game would be huge for our team. It would give us some huge confidence in terms of the season and going from there. It’s not going to be easy. … We’ve got to play a perfect game to come out of here with a win.”

My thoughts. I wouldn’t go crazy parsing “to come in here and try to win a game would be huge,” as opposed to saying, “to come in here and win a game would be huge.” That was just the way he said it. What I found interesting was that he thinks his team has to play …