Wizards 101 - Hawks 90

Box Score
Game Flow
Post Recap
Times Recap
Wizards Insider Recap
Truth About It Live Blog

Highest plus/minus: Caron Butler (14)
Lowest plus/minus: Antonio Daniels (-3)

If you're looking for the reason why the Wizards won it's simple: They just wanted it more.  Brendan went into "n" mode ("n" mode being the times that people call him Brendan instead of Brenda) in the first quarter scoring 11 points including two on a ridiculous skyhook that you never see out of him and he also held Horford & Pachulia to a combined 11 points.  Stevenson showed he wanted it more by actually making a shot and almost doubling his scoring output for the season with 11 points on 4 of 6 from the field and at the same time keeping Joe Johnson from doing his thing.  When the two starters that aren't in the Big 3 hit double digits and play solid D, the Wizards are hard to beat.

The last time Brendan Haywood connected on a hook, it landed on Etan Thomas' face.
(AP Photo/John Amis)

The Big 3 still did their thing too, Butler and Jamison (who called a team meeting after the Denver lost that seemed to do the trick) were dominant all night and Gilbert made two excellent drives near the end of the game to put it away, the second of which put the game away and led Eddie Jordan to bang his fist on the scorers' table in what was possibly the best and weirdest moment of the season to date.  I mean, Buchantz and Chenier noticed him banging away at that table, and both the Post and the Times mention it in their reports, I think it was a telling moment for that game and maybe for the season.  What you saw yesterday was just a glimpse of what we were all excited about coming into the season and what this team is capable of.  Now that they finally have a W in the books, let's see if gives them the confidence to go out and play like this the rest of the way.