Smith scored 19 of his 29 points in the first half as the San Antonio Spurs won their seventh straight game over the Atlanta Hawks, 120-112.
Smith, who with the Hawks from 1994-99, got hot from the outset as the Spurs opened a 30-10 lead with 2:39 left in the first quarter. He had nine points during that spurt and capped it with a fast-break dunk.
 San Antonio's Bruce Bowen gets off a shot. Scott Cunningham NBAE/Getty Images |
Smith has scored over 20 points just two other times this season. One of those was on November 3, when he poured in a season-high 36 points against the Portland Trail Blazers. The 6-8 guard was with Portland for two seasons before being traded for Derek Anderson and Steve Kerr on July 25.
After his big night, Smith tried to downplay it.
"I just try to get wins," Smith said. "Overall, our whole team has been playing good. It was a great win considering when we got here last night. More importantly we're coming into a flow. We still feel we can get better."
It wasn't just Smith who was hot. The Spurs, who placed six players in double figures in Tuesday's win against Washington, had five reach that mark against Atlanta.
The Spurs, who came in as the NBA's top 3-point shooting team at 43.2 percent, continued shooting well from the perimeter in the first half. They made 9-of-11 from the arc in the first half en route to a 14-of-20 showing.
"We need to be aggressive and come out and set the tempo," Hawks guard Jason Terry said. "We're scoring 100 points. We just need to step up the defense. They're supposed to kill you inside and instead they shoot 70 percent from three. Whenever I ran at a shooter, it seemed like they had other shooters waiting in the wings to shoot the dagger."
Bruce Bowen scored 13 of his season-high 21 points in the first half. Known as a defensive player, Bowen, was 8-for-8 from the floor and made four 3-pointers.
Terry scored 11 of his 22 points in the fourth quarter and Shareef Abdur-Rahim collected 18 and 12 rebounds for the Hawks.
After three quarters, the Hawks trailed 97-84 but closed to single digits numerous times in the final period.
"It was kind of like the tale of two games," Spurs coach Gregg Popovich said. "We played really well in the first half and then the defense really went in the toilet in the second half. They made a heck of a run, then we executed offensively well down the stretch to save our butts."
The Hawks were within 106-100 with just over four minutes to play, but Abdur-Rahim was whistled for a technical foul and the Hawks never threatened again.
"We did not come out ready to play," Abdur-Rahim said. "If we can play that hard in the second half. We can play that hard in the beginning. We need to decide who we are going to be. Will we let guys beat up on us, or will we play with passion and decide we want to win games?
"That was cowardly basketball to be down 20 and then want to play hard. It's nothing more than a fight. You don't let a guy throw 20 punches and then decide to fight."
Antonio Daniels ended Atlanta's comeback when he sank a 40-foot 3-pointer with 1:33 to go that gave the Spurs a 115-103 lead.
The game was attended by just 8,253, the smallest crowd since Philips Arena opened in 1999.