Wizards at Hawks final score: Washington falls to Atlanta, 118-111, behind a third quarter shooting drought

The Washington Wizards didn’t get the job done on the road as the Atlanta Hawks come up with the 118-111 victory. This was the second meeting of the two teams in four days.

The Wizards cold shooting in the third quarter as well as shooting under 30 percent from three-point range didn’t help them at all. In the third quarter after a halftime score of 63-60, the Hawks went on a 12-0 run and just didn’t stop from there.

Bradley Beal led the way in scoring with 24 points, but just wasn’t enough. The return of Daniel Gafford didn’t go as planned as he went out the game 10 minutes in due to foul trouble getting four fouls in the first half.

Kyle Kuzma had 18 points grabbing six boards, while Montrezl Harrell wasn’t as noticeable on the scoring end as his 13 points in 33 minutes of play was pretty low comparing to other games this season.

The Hawks had all their starters in double figures, plus two reserves in double digits. Trae Young finished with 26 points, six assists and four rebounds. Bogdan Bogdanovic had 16 points and was 4-of-6 from beyond the arc. Cam Reddish and Danilo Gallinari combined for 27 points off the bench and shot a combined 7-of-13 from three-point range as well.

Clearly the defense was not there either due to fatigue or Washington just couldn’t keep up and had an off night. It didn’t help either as the Hawks shot 29 free throws to the Wizards 16.

FIRST HALF SUMMARY

At the half, the score was 63-60 Atlanta’s way. The Wizards had overcame a 13-point deficit to bring it down to three. Beal was the reason Washington was able to get back in the game as he had 19 first half points and two assists. Kuzma had 11 points and three rebounds to end the half. Everyone on the Wizards bench had scored at least two points with Deni Avdija leading the way with seven points.

Davis Bertans went out early due to an ankle injury only playing three minutes scoring two points.

The shocker was Harrell only having two points and four rebounds at the half as we’re so used to his double-digit scoring by halftime.

As for the home team, the Hawks, they had a good overall shooting from starters and reserves in the first half. Young scored 14 with Clint Capela and Bogdanovic both having 10 points. Reddish had seven points and Gallinari was hot from three-point range shooting 3-of-4. Gallinari had nine in the first half.

One of the big differences between the teams was three-point shooting. Atlanta was 7-of-16, while Washington was 9-of-23. It’s literally one of those situations where if you live by the three then you die by the three.

Washington returns back to D.C. for a three-game homestand starting with the Toronto Raptors on Wednesday night. The game is scheduled for 7 p.m. ET televised on NBC Sports Washington. The Wizards will be sporting their new City Edition jerseys for the first time.