Wizards at Hawks final score: Hawks easily beat Wizards 130-121

If you look at the final score you might be tempted to think there was an interesting game here. But a quick glance at the “Game Flow” graph reveals that the Hawks opened a comfortable lead towards the end of the first half, and the Wizards never got close until both teams dumped their benches and the Wizards went on one of their signature garbage-time-comeback-runs to cut the deficit to single (well, 9) digits.

Kuz had an efficient night for his standards (11-21 from the field, 1-6 from deep), while Avdija had himself one of his best games as a Wizard (10-16 from the field, 2-4 from deep) to the tune of 22 points in 24 minutes. He was also the only starter to go positive (+3) compared with

• Kuz (-16)
• JP (-22)
• Tyus Jones (-23)
• Muscala (-22)

Dear Ol’ Anthony Gill (and also Ryan Rollins) went +17 in the aforementioned garbage-time-run in just 7 minutes! And Bilal Coulibaly was +15 in 28 minutes.

For me the takeaway is obvious: Let Coulibaly start and bench Muscala, and also bench Poole when he decides not to defend. And, finally, for God’s sake, please bench Galinari for the next 70 games.

For the Hawks, Trae Young actually played for 35 minutes (!) and scored (only) 23 points. The Hawks went on a short 9-player rotation which is quite surprising, especially given the other team was the Wizards.

The Wizards continue their East Coast road-trip on Friday at Miami.

Here are the highlights from tonight: