A month or so ago, when the Hawks were just a handful of games above .500, Kyle Korver said something surprising.
"I still believe we can be a better team than what we were last season," he said, comparing this current Hawks squad to a counterpart that compiled a 60-22 record a year ago. At the time, the statement seemed far-fetched; this season, the Hawks matched last year's loss total in just the 49th of their 82 games.
Perhaps Korver saw the Hawks ready to turn the corner though. In winning 10 of their past 13 games, they have changed the outlook for what might happen when their regular season ends in April. Korver's vision no longer seems like such a reach.
The Hawks haven't been a perfect team by any stretch of the imagination. They lost an uncanny number of close games early in the season. They are still prone to a bad shooting night or two. And a pair of teams sits above them in the Eastern Conference standings.
But there are some ways in which this team outranks last year's team. Here is a list of a few of them.
5) The Defense
The Hawks have figured out the secret to sound defense and the numbers are uncanny.
Atlanta has had the best defense in the league over the past three months, yielding just 97.5 points per 100 possessions. Korver likes the predictability of a lockdown defense.
"I feel like our identity right now is based on defense and not on offense, and I think that's something you can count on more," he said. “Defensively, I think we're better than we were last year.”
The numbers bear out Korver's theory. Prior to Monday, the Hawks had held opponents to 50 percent shooting or below for 36 consecutive games, the longest such streak in the NBA this season and one that covered the entirety of the 2016 calendar year. They go into every game knowing that they have a good chance of winning simply by virtue of the fact that most opponents will struggle to score on them.
Head Coach Mike Budenholzer credited the defensive success to his team's approach to pick-and-roll defense.
"There are so many pick and rolls in an NBA game," he said. "It's so hard to guard. You're finding a way to make it more difficult on your opponent in pick-and-rolls. There are so many different reads and options for the offense. If you're taking away one or two or three of them and just making them a little bit uncomfortable, then that continues to be every team's point of emphasis."
Paul Millsap liked the energy and cohesiveness of his teammates.
"The hands have been active," he said. "Guys have helped each other. It hasn't been perfect, but for the most part the activity has been there."
Thabo Sefolosha noted that day-to-day strategic adjustments help, and he praised the help coming from behind the scenes.
"It starts with the guys in the video room," he said, "and just being able to understand what we need to take away from the other team."
4) A balanced attack from all positions on the floor
In theory, the Hawks had a couple of question marks, a pair of defensive tweaks to which they could be susceptible, when the 2015 Playoffs began.
First, opponents tried to defend their point guards by laying back and playing under the pick-and-roll. While it's debatable whether or not that idea worked last season, this season it likely won't. Jeff Teague is among the league leaders in three-point percentage. His 39.8 percent mark puts him among the top shooters from the point guard position.
The Hawks don't have a ton of guys who can create off the dribble, so Teague's ability to create for his fellow starters is crucial – and his three-point shot is the starting point of getting defenses off kilter. When they can't wait back for him in the paint, it opens up everything that the Hawks want to do.
Second, teams were trying to disrupt the Hawks by switching off-ball screens, and to a lesser degree, the pick-and-roll plays that they didn't go under. In order to counter, the Hawks need to have as many potent scorers as they can on the court at the same time.
But they have more scoring from more sources than they did a season ago. Dennis Schröder, Kent Bazemore and Sefolosha are all fitting better in the offense, and all three are making more plays off the dribble. Then, in addition, there is even more potential in bringing Tim Hardaway Jr. off the bench. Last season, the Hawks didn't have a designated shooter among their reserves. This season, they will, if Hardaway plays anything like the player who has scored 57 points in the last three games.
The Hawks' starting backcourt expressed optimism over the balanced attack.
"We're not relying on one or two guys every night," Korver said. "It feels like there are more guys who can go out there and get 20 on any given night, and just having more of those threats helps us."
Teague echoed the same sentiment.
"We have guys who can play at a high level: bench and starters," he said. "I think we lacked scoring a bit when we needed it in crunch time, but we've got guys who can make shots."
3) An improved three-point defense
NBA teams are taking and making three-point field goals at record rates. Defenses have to make limiting long-range looks into a priority or face the consequences of giving up points in bunches. By and large, the data shows that the NBA's best teams all do a sound job in limiting their opponents from three.
Last season, though, the Hawks led the NBA in opponent three-point attempts.
"It was a talking point coming into the season," Budenholzer said. "Even though we were 7th in efficiency last year, one area where we could improve was if we just reduced the attempts. The percentage at which they made them (last season) was an acceptable rate, but it was just too many."
Here's a look at where the Hawks stood last season. The first priority is to be low on the graph, as the Hawks were, for yielding a low percentage of made threes. But the three-point shot is, on average, a more efficient shot than other jump shots. In other words, it is good to be on the left side of the graph. Last season, the Hawks were on the far right, allowing almost 26 attempts per game.
This season, the Hawks are not only allowing a low percentage of made threes, but they're also limiting the number of attempts.
Millsap sees the progress as a result of smart effort.
"We have guys fighting over screens, guys closing out to shooters and getting them off the three-point line," he said. "Our big emphasis is to get guys off the three-point line and make them make a play within the medium-range area."
2) The Hawks find open shots
The Hawks rank second in the NBA with 25.5 assists per game. That number isn't a hollow one: they also rank second in adjusted assists as well, a stat that includes adjustments for free throw assists (a pass that sets up a trip to the free throw line) and secondary assists (the pass before the assist).
What truly makes the Hawks' offense impressive though is the frequency with which it creates wide open shots. According to the player-tracking data of NBA.com/Stats, 26.9 percent of the shots that the Hawks generate are taken six or more feet from the nearest defender. That number isn't just the best mark in the NBA; it's also an outlier a level of magnitude above their peers.
Why hasn't the frequency of open shots translated into instant success? The Hawks have only converted on a below-average number of them to this point of the season.
They can get better on offense by making a higher percentage of these open shots, and it's a reasonable guess that they might do so. Their two most regarded marksmen, Korver and Hardaway, have gradually improved their accuracy all season long, and they're peaking at the right time, just a month from the start of the postseason.
1) Thabo Sefolosha
The Hawks suffered a number of nagging injuries last April and May, but the one that tested their depth most was losing Sefolosha outright to a broken leg.
Sefolosha went to some shootarounds and practices to be with his teammates, but he was behind the scenes during the playoff games, splitting his time between the back rooms of Philips Arena and his home.
"I always tried to come down here as often as possible," he said. "I was watching it sometime from the locker room, but I was definitely with the group before the games. It was tough. I wanted the team to do well, and (it was difficult) when you see them not doing well or losing a game."
The Hawks missed his presence even more on the court, and this season, Sefolosha is showing exactly what it was that they missed. Despite routinely being given the toughest assignment on the perimeter, Sefolosha is shutting opponents down. Players guarded by him are making an incredibly low 30.3 percent of their shots from 15 feet and beyond, and he's doing that work on the outside without yielding opportunities elsewhere.
Going down the checklist, Sefolosha has been a part of every positive defensive trend for Atlanta. Three-point defense? Check. A bench unit that posts some of the best defensive ratings in the NBA? Check. Steals? The Hawks sit third in the NBA in steals, 9.3 per game, and Sefolosha leads the bench with 1.2 per game. All in all, Sefolosha is enjoying one of the finest seasons of his 10-year career.
Less than a year removed from a career-threatening injury, Sefolosha doesn't look like the same player. He looks better.
He has upped his offensive production. His overall field goal percentage has jumped from 41.8 percent last season to 50.6 percent this season. Teams tend to give him more room on the perimeter than, say, Korver or Hardaway, and Sefolosha has made effective use of such opportunities. He has made 44.1 percent of the three-point shots that he has taken from the corners, and he has mixed in more efficient drives to the hoop than he did a season ago.
The Hawks may not have 60 wins when the postseason rolls around this year, but they will have Sefolosha, a vital cog in a defensive machine and a player who can impact a game without the ball in a way that few players can.
Story by KL ChouinardTwitter: @KLChouinard