The Atlanta Hawks enter the first round of the NBA Playoffs as the No. 5 seed as they travel to Madison Square Garden to face the New York Knicks.
The two teams met three times during the regular season and despite the Knicks winning each of them, the Hawks have reason to be extremely confident heading into this series for a few different reasons.
The first two losses were under Lloyd Pierce, and as we know, it's been a completely different Hawks teams since Nate McMillan took over.
In the early part of the season the Hawks lost to the Knicks by five (113-108), a game in which Danilo Gallinari and Tony Snell didn't play.
In the second matchup the Knicks won by 11 (123-112) in a game that didn't include Bogdan Bogdanovic or De'Andre Hunter.
In the final match, just under a month ago, the Hawks took the Knicks to overtime despite losing Trae Young in the third quarter (137-127), in a game where they were once again short-handed as Gallinari, Snell, and Hunter were all out.
Under Nate McMillan this season the Hawks are 27-11 overall and in those 38 games they have been among the best teams in the entire NBA.
The Hawks are going to need to steal at-least one game on the road. If they do, they should feel pretty good considering their record at home recently, including an active 11-game home winning streak.
Aside from just the change from Pierce to McMillan is the fact that the Hawks are healthier now than they have been all season. Both Gallinari and Hunter missed two of the three losses to the Knicks and Bagdanovic missed one as well.
Hunter might be the key returner here as his defensive abilities could loom large in slowing down Knicks star Julius Randle.
The Hawks were up double-digits against the Knicks before Trae Young went out. It's safe to say that the Knicks will be seeing a different team than they did in the regular season.
While the expectations for both teams are to win this series, it seems the Hawks are much more a different and a better team than they were when these teams met in the regular season.