Basketball: Without Clint Capela, the Hawks bow to the Heat

The leaders of the Eastern Conference were on the court, on the night of Sunday to Monday, in the NBA, and they all won, remaining respectively in the first three places: Boston beat Washington (130-121), Milwaukee dismissed Dallas ( 124-115) and Cleveland defeated Detroit (102-94). Atlanta, still deprived of Clint Capela, was beaten at home by Miami (98-106) and is in 5th place. Suffering from toothache, the Geneva pivot missed his second game in a row, for the Hawks’ second straight defeat.

In Boston, the Celtics (16-4), carried by Jaylen Brown, author of 36 points with a shooting success percentage of 50% (15/30 including 2/7 at three points), embellished with a faultless free throws, brought his team to victory, the third in a row, after the little stoppage in Chicago last Monday.

Six other players scored more than ten points for the finalist team last season, whose success was almost certain at the start of the last quarter, which started 29 points ahead of the Wizards. And this in the absence of one of their leaders, Jayson Tatum, injured in an ankle.

In Milwaukee, the Bucks (14-5) controlled the Mavericks, with their Greek star Giannis Antetokounmpo scoring 30 points and grabbing 11 rebounds. His teammate Grayson Allen, however, stole the show, scoring 25 points with a staggering shooting percentage: 8 of 10 two-pointers and 7 of 8 three-pointers.

In the ranks of Dallas, Slovenian star Luka Doncic, author of 27 points, could not prevent his team from suffering its fourth consecutive defeat (9-10, 11th).

The Cleveland Cavaliers (13-7) went on to win on the Detroit floor. But they had to whip. Donovan Mitchell’s teammates, the game’s top scorer with 32 points despite a lot of waste (only 11 shots returned out of 31 attempts), were trailing by three points at the start of the last quarter, where they tipped the match then inflicting a 29-16 to the Pistons.

The Memphis Grizzlies, third in the Western Conference, blew the victory over the New York Knicks, who came to die four points in front of their Madison Square Garden audience (127-123). Ja Morant was one of the main architects of Memphis’ victory. By returning a crucial basket 13 sec 9/10 from the buzzer, to put his team ahead 124-123, and by signing a triple-double with 27 points, 10 rebounds and 14 assists.

In the West, the Golden State Warriors of Stephen Curry, who came close to the triple-double by scoring 25 points, taking 11 rebounds and distilling 8 assists, are doing better. They outscored the Minnesota Timberwolves 137-114 to claim their second road win of the season.

The Warriors, NBA title holders, got off to a thunderous start in this match by winning the first quarter 47 to 27, and they line up three wins in a row for the first time, with a finally positive record (11-10). They are ninth in their conference, close to the qualifying places for the play-offs.

Still in the West, among the teams at the top of the table, the Los Angeles Clippers (5th) beat the Indiana Pacers 114 to 100. In this meeting, the interior of the Clippers, Croatian Ivica Zubac, scored 31 points but above all took 29 rebounds, best performance of the season in this sector.