The Atlanta Hawks have avoided the worst-case scenario with Trae Young’s knee injury, but they’ll likely be without their floor general for the foreseeable future — starting with Friday’s NBA Cup home opener against the winless, injury-riddled Indiana Pacers.
Young sprained his right knee when teammate Mouhamed Gueye fell backward into the four-time All-Star’s leg during the first quarter of Atlanta’s 117-112 win over the Brooklyn Nets on Wednesday.
Young, who averages 17.8 points and a team-high 7.8 assists, grabbed his knee immediately and was ruled out before undergoing an MRI on Thursday.
Even with Young playing only seven minutes, the Hawks kept the ball moving smoothly. They racked up 33 assists to just eight turnovers against Brooklyn.
“Anytime a player of Trae’s caliber (goes down), particularly someone who has the ball and orchestrates plays on the offensive end, there’s an adjustment we had to make,” said Hawks coach Quin Snyder.
Asked about Young’s injury, Snyder added, “The most important thing is it’s not an ACL.”
“Whether it was Luke (Kennard), Nickeil (Alexander-Walker), Dyson (Daniels) or JJ (Jalen Johnson), the key thing when we’re playing that way is that everybody’s got to be willing to play with a pass … obviously it’s something we’ll have to keep working on, depending on where Trae is with his health.”
The consistent Alexander-Walker, who tallied 18 points, two steals and three blocks against the Nets, looks set for a bigger role in Young’s absence.
Pairing Alexander-Walker with Daniels would give Atlanta a particularly strong defensive backcourt, but Snyder emphasized that defense has to be a full-team effort.
“One thing our team is discovering is there’s not any one player that can shut a team down,” Snyder said. “Those two guys (Daniels and Alexander-Walker) are really impactful, but for us to defend at the level we want to, we need five guys.”
While Young is the Hawks’ only injury concern, Indiana’s roster is severely depleted with a league-high eight players sidelined.
Tyrese Haliburton (Achilles — out for season), Bennedict Mathurin (toe), Andrew Nembhard (shoulder), Obi Toppin (foot), T.J. McConnell (hamstring), Johnny Furphy (foot), Taleon Peter (groin) and Kam Jones (back) all missed Wednesday’s 107-105 road loss to the Dallas Mavericks.
Despite being so undermanned, the Pacers almost secured a last-second victory.
With Indiana trailing by three with 3.4 seconds left, RayJ Dennis hit his first free throw then deliberately missed his second. Aaron Nesmith grabbed the offensive rebound but missed a potential game-winning three as the buzzer sounded.
“(I liked) the way the guys hung in at the end, giving us a chance when we were down 12,” said Indiana coach Rick Carlisle. “The last play was a great job by our guys and just unlucky. They (the Mavericks) had some good fortune on that.”
Foul discipline continues to test Indiana’s already stretched depth, with the Pacers committing a league-high 28.5 fouls per game.
“Fouling is a real problem for us right now,” Carlisle said. “When you put the other team on the line with the clock stopped and they can set their defense, it’s going to be harder to play with the kind of tempo and pace that you want. We’ve got to concentrate on doing a better job there.”
Atlanta reached last year’s NBA Cup quarterfinals while Indiana went winless in four games.
