NBA Power Rankings Week 20: What history will Milwaukee Bucks make?

Last week: Lost at Philadelphia 129-112, lost to Orlando 130-120, beat Brooklyn 141-118, beat Portland 129-117

This week: Monday vs. Memphis, Friday at Washington, Saturday at Memphis

With wins Friday and Saturday night at home over the Nets and Trail Blazers, the Atlanta Hawks did something they had not done in more than a year — sweep both ends of a back-to-back. Atlanta hadn’t won games on consecutive nights since Dec. 28-29, 2018, when they won an overtime game at Minnesota and followed that up with a win at home over the Cavaliers.

The Hawks have gone 4-2 in their last six games and are percentage points ahead of the Knicks. Atlanta is now 13th in the East and outside the worst three records in the NBA (which will get the best odds at the No. 1 overall pick at 14.0 percent in the lottery).

Trae Young put up big numbers even if he didn’t have the most efficient week, averaging 28.0 points, 12.5 assists and 3.8 rebounds in 35.1 minutes per game over four games, while shooting only 38.8 percent overall and a paltry 21.6 percent on 9.3 deep attempts a night. Young put up 37 points with 11 dimes in Wednesday’s loss to the Magic.

Last week: Lost at Indiana 119-80, beat New York 107-101, won at Toronto 99-96

This week: Sunday vs. Milwaukee, Tuesday vs. San Antonio, Thursday vs. Denver, Saturday vs. Houston

The Charlotte Hornets bounced back nicely from a blowout Tuesday at Indiana with a pair of victories, including a stunning road victory at Toronto on Friday that wasn’t without some controversy. The win over the Raptors was just Charlotte’s second this season on the road over a team currently better than .500; the other came Jan. 4 at Dallas.

This week, Charlotte gets four straight at home. The bad news is that three of those games are against some of the NBA’s elite in the Bucks, Nuggets and Rockets. Still, the Hornets have very quietly won five of their last seven and trail Brooklyn by five games for eighth place in the Eastern Conference.

Individually, Terry Rozier averaged 16.3 points, 5.7 assists and 4.0 rebounds in 32.4 minutes per game over Charlotte’s three games last week, shooting 37.5 percent overall and going 8-for-15 from 3-point range. He scored 26 points with four assists and three rebounds on 7-of-15 shooting, knocking down 4-of-7 from deep, in Wednesday’s win over the Knicks.