I went to the game again last night (alone as the rest of Riseup has become MIA) and once again, the atmosphere was electric and the game was amazing. There were two times where the Hawks looked dead in the water, including being down by 10 at the end of the 3rd Quarter. I was about to leave at the beginning of the 4th Quarter, but thankfully I stuck it out long enough to see an improbable comeback. Joe Johnson was unstoppable; he showed the rest of the country what he’s been doing here for the past three years. Overall, the game was every bit as magical as Game #3.

The Spin: Hawks magnets that I “lost”; they somehow ended up being stuck to the escalator within a minute of my receving them.

I see that Friday’s game is already sold out; I can’t believe the instant fame and popularity that the team is enjoying. Even more unbelievable to me is that i’m actually going to be using my Game #6 tickets! 

Ismail and I went to last night’s Game 3 win over the Celtics. What a crowd! Never at Philips have I seen anything like the intensity of crowd that showed up last night to cheer on the Hawks. Where in the hell did all of these fans come from? I didn’t even know the Hawks had 19K fans; they never show up in large numbers during the season. While there were Celtics fans in attendance, the vast majority of the crowd was pro-Hawks. The paper is full of stories about how great the crowd was and how they played a difference in the game; I never thought i’d read that about a Hawks crowd. After the game, people were actually in the portals and outside on the streets chanting “Let’s Go Hawks” and, even better, giving Celtics fans an earful. The passion was a beautiful thing-I just hope that it can somehow carry over into the future.

The boys came out to play last night, especially Josh Smith and Al Horford. Josh had 3 or 4 crazy slams, but more importantly, he hit his outside looks and made the Celtics pay for leaving him open. The thing I really liked about the team last night is that they had four players with 6+ assists, a testament to their unselfish, up-tempo performance.

Monday will be very interesting-I fear that the Celtics might counter Saturday’s poor performance by coming out and drilling us. I hope i’m wrong, but the Celts don’t have the best record in the league for nothing.

The Spin: Ismail took the spin for me and we won a 2 hour bowling certificate as the Mystery Prize, a $69.99 value. Not too shabby of a prize.

Oddest sighting of the night: A guy had a jacket that had “Thank God 4 Kobe” emblazened on the back of it. I’m sure that there’s several ladies out there that would disagree with that sentiment.

Can the Hawks win at least one game? I think they’ll win one in Atlanta, forcing the series to go 5 games.

Two games left and they only need to win one of two against Orlando and Miami or have the Pacers lose either tonight at Washington or on Wednesday.

BTW, I received my Hawks Playoff Tickets today; they’re for all rounds, including the Finals. It’s funny to see Hawks NBA Finals tickets.