ATLANTA - Golden State coach Don Nelson had no trouble putting together a game plan against the Atlanta Hawks.
Baron Davis scored 35 points and Stephen Jackson had 29 to lead the Golden State to its fourth straight victory, 135-118 over Atlanta on Tuesday night.
``We're used to playing at this pace, and Atlanta isn't,'' Nelson said. ``We just put the pedal to the metal and didn't let up.''
The Warriors, who lead the NBA in scoring, had their season high in points. Golden State improved to 16-12 on the road, its most victories away from Oakland since 1993-94.
``We make people play to our level,'' Davis said. ``We figured that this is not comfortable scoring at a pace like this. That's our motto: Stay close on the road.''
Monta Ellis scored 20 points and Mickael Pietrus finished with 19 points and 12 rebounds for the Warriors, who have won 17 of 23 to hold onto the eighth and final playoff spot in the Western Conference.
Joe Johnson had 38 points for the Hawks, losers of two straight and 10 of 13.
``They were red-hot, and we couldn't cool them off,'' Johnson said. ``They came out in the second half very aggressive and hit us hard. We didn't recover from that.''
Golden State never trailed after Davis' fast-break layup with 10:17 left in the third. A fast-break dunk by Kelenna Azubuike with 8:13 remaining in the game made it 115-95 and gave the Warriors their biggest lead.
Jackson's 3-pointer with 7:45 remaining in the third capped a 15-0 run for Golden State, which outscored the Hawks 22-13 in second-chance points.
In Atlanta's seven-point victory at Golden State last month, Jackson missed the game with a sprained ankle.
``I thought we did a fairly good job on him in the first half,'' Hawks coach Mike Woodson said. ``In the second half, he got away. He was dominating mismatches. That's how they play. We thought we were just going to come in here and outshoot this team up and down the floor.''
Jackson's six 3-pointers matched his single-game season-high, set in a November win at Washington.
``Joe had a killer first half, but we play like this in our sleep,'' Jackson said. ``We knew if we continued to play our style and start playing better defense second half, we'd get a lead, and we were able to do that.''
Marvin Williams and Josh Smith each had 20 points for Atlanta.
The Warriors' previous high in scoring came in a 130-121 overtime victory over San Antonio on Jan. 7.
Johnson had 29 points on 11-for-16 shooting in the first half, but was just 2-for-6 from the field over the next two quarters.
``We just wanted to confuse him a little bit and get back to rebounding and getting out on the break,'' Ellis said. ``When Baron plays like he did tonight, we're a whole different team. When he's aggressive in taking the ball to the hoop, nine times out of 10 we'll get the win.''
Golden State has scored at least 100 points in 23 straight games, a span during which the Warriors are 17-6. They improved to 23-3 when leading or tied after three quarters, this despite getting outscored 33-8 on foul shots.
``Getting outshot 40-10 from the free-throw line and winning by 18, that's an amazing stat, really,'' Nelson said. ``We tried to play a very aggressive game, Not having any big guys we had to play a small lineup and it worked out pretty well.''
Thursday
May 1st, 2025
5:51PM
