Welcome to the Tuesday night brick show, folks. Powered by seven points from Joe Johnson, the Hawks lead the Heat 10-11 through one quarter. Johnson has had his way with Dwyane Wade offensively, scoring Atlanta's first seven points as the Hawks have soared to an early lead.
Miami on the other hand, looks terrible. They aren't playing much defense and they definitely do not have much going on offensively. It looks like they've channeled that Cleveland Cavaliers team that got pasted by the Los Angeles Lakers by more than 50 last week.
Through one quarter, the Heat can't buy a bucket. LeBron James is shooting a miserable 1-for-8 from the field in his return after missing a pair with an ankle injury. He has four points. Wade posted one bucket on 1-for-4 shooting from the field The rest of the team is 2-for-7 from the field. Miami is shooting just 21-percent from the field and is losing the battle of the boards 16-12.
On the flip side of the ball, the Hawks look good, posting a 14-0 advantage over the Heat in the paint.
Johnson is finding Al Horford early and often when he draws the double team and even Josh Smith has a long field goal (and a dunk). Atlanta is all over the court, scrapping for rebounds, throwing bodies all over the court and utterly dominating the Heat through the first 12 minutes of the game.
Horford has six points and six boards through one quarter.
Atlanta is up by eight despite shooting just 38-percent (9-for-28) from the field. The Hawks do have seven assists on those nine field goals.
Coach Erik Spoelstra is looking for some sort of spark, trying every combination possible to get some sort of offense from his team. But nothing seemed to work until Mario Chalmers drained a 3-pointer to end the first quarter to cut the lead back to single-digits.