Atlanta Hawks: Five takeaways from the first six games

The defense has been good but still a work in progress

Last season, the Atlanta Hawks allowed opponents to make nearly half of their shots (47.8 FG percentage), good for 26th in the league, and ranked 22nd against 3-pointers after allowing the opposition to knock them down at a 36.3 percent clip.

This season, the Hawks are seventh in the league, holding opponents to 43.8 percent shooting from the field, and rank second in defending the three-ball, holding the opposition to 29.6 percent shooting from downtown.

While these are things to be happy about, you must take it with a grain of salt as they are still struggling with interior defense, allowing 50 points in the paint per game, the eighth-most in the entire NBA.

To make matters worse, the Hawks are allowing more points in the paint since Clint Capela has returned from injury. He missed the first two games of the season, and the Hawks allowed just 44 points in the paint per game during that span. In the four games since his return to the lineup, opponents are averaging a whopping 53 points in the paint against Atlanta, fourth-worst in the league.

Capela was brought in via trade last season to man the paint for the Hawks but never got to play for the team until this past preseason. He missed the first two games of the season with a sore Achilles after claiming to be 100 percent healthy all offseason.

Since his return, it’s fairly obvious he isn’t moving as well as he has in the past, but there’s growing confidence that as he continues to play and get his legs back under him and timing down, his play should improve. Simply put, the Hawks need to do a much better job protecting the basket. Hopefully, when rookie Onyeka Okongwu is healthy and ready to go, he can help in that department.