Jock Landale makes a splash to help Hawks past Jazz

Former McEachern High School standout and Jazz forward Ace Bailey tied the game with a 3 with 10 seconds to play in the game after a timeout.

But Hawks guard Nickeil Alexander-Walker advanced the ball even though the Hawks had two timeouts under their belt. Alexander-Walker drove into the paint before pulling up, then hitting a turnaround jumper that bounced on the rim and then rolled in to put the Hawks up with 1.3 left.

Bailey’s responding 3 went wide and the Hawks held on.

Quick stats: Jalen Johnson finished with his 10th triple-double of the season with 22 points, 16 rebound and 15 assists.

Landale finished with 26 points, 11 rebounds, five assists and four blocks. While Alexander-Walker had 23 points and five assists.

Key moment

Despite reaching the metro-Atlanta area on Wednesday night, Landale didn’t miss a beat with his offensive game. Landale scored 17 points in his first 15 minutes in a Hawks uniform.

Landale hit the gas toward the end of the second quarter, finding Dyson Daniels on a cut down the lane to the basket. Then Landale sunk his third 3 of the game before making his fourth 3 with a little over a minute to play in the half.

Highlight play

The Hawks got a burst of energy from rookie big Asa Newell in the second quarter. With 11:14 to play Corey Kispert let off a 3 that rimmed out. But Newell was ready and jumped up for the putback.

Newell’s was so enthusiastic to stick the dunk, he put his own teammate on a poster.

What they said

“They obviously offered to fly me in the following morning, but I kind of said, you know, if I’m looking to play that next night, I want to get there as soon as possible. So, (I) loaded up the truck and hit the road for five and a half hours.” -- Landale on his journey to Atlanta.

“I think anytime you’ve got a team that kind of puts trust in you on short notice, like that, it says volumes about them.” -- Landale on Thursday night’s performance.

“All that I’ve been through in my career, it’s really cool to finally work to gain that trust from somebody. In late game, playing with Ant (Anthony Edwards), playing with guys like B.I. (Brandon Ingram), Donovan (Mitchell), Zion (Williamson), like so many guys that had the ball late-game and were trusted to make plays, to go out there and honestly, like, carrying a team and in a possession so to speak or whatever for sure. And for me, it’s really cool, because I work for those moments.” -- Alexander-Walker on gaining the trust of Hawks coach Quin Snyder in late-game situations.

Up next

The Hawks host the Hornets on Saturday