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The Atlanta Hawks owned the worst record Against The Spread heading into 2024, covering in just eight games this season.
January 7
The Hawks are just 2-7 Against The Spread when there is an overlay detected with the line. They are 0-6 ATS when wrongly favored. As a dog when there is an underlay, they have gone 1-4 Against The Spread.
Atlanta has rarely found itself a dog of more than 5 points yet they have ten losses of five points or more since December 1 whereas they only have 3 wins by five or more points since that time.
They might get lucky as a -2 point favorite in Orlando as the Magic are currently reeling from the injury bug.
The injuries were mostly already factored into this line as we get a number of 5.68 Magic assuming a team in full health. The current spread represents around an 8 point overlay for Atlanta.
One can certainly argue that the Hawks are due to see adjustments with their ATS record. They've covered in four of their last ten games overall and are 8-2 Straight Up in the last ten meetings against Orlando. Again, this will be a depleted Magic squad.
The Hawks defense surrendered 150 points to the Indiana Pacers in their last game. The Hawks also give up the third most points per game in the league at 123.9. They allowed the Pacers to make 60 of their 94 (63.8 percent) shots from the field and 19 of their 39 (48.7 percent) 3-pointers.
"I don't know that we did anything at the level that we needed to in order to win against these guys," Hawks head coach Quin Snyder said. "We need to run back harder on defense. Even early in the game, you need to have a sense of urgency against these guys in transition. That's something we have got to clean up. We have got to be ready to go in Orlando."
The Hawks certainly have the ability to score with Dejounte Murray scoring 30 points on 13 of 19 shooting to the Pacers. And of course they've got Trae Young, who struggled on Friday and finished with 13 points (4-of-18 FGs), two rebounds, six assists, two steals and one triple against Indiana.
- Don Shapiro, Gambling911.com
