BBNBA: Goodbye to PJ Washington and Keldon Johnson

The NBA Play-In games haven’t exactly gone swimmingly for former Kentucky guys. KAT struggled in Minnesota’s win on Tuesday while Keldon Johnson and PJ Washington saw their team’s seasons end on Wednesday. On the bright side though, both Washington and Johnson scored 15+ in their final games. Let’s talk postseason hoops.

Hawks demolish Hornets

Atlanta led at the end of every quarter in the East’s 9/10 elimination game, though Charlotte kept it close through halftime. But in the second half, Trae Young and the Hawks slammed their foot on the gas pedal, turning an eight-point lead at the break into a 26-point advantage by the end of the third quarter. Charlotte offered little resistance in the final period, setting up a matchup for the Hawks with the Cleveland Cavaliers to determine the eight-seed on Friday.

Hawks guards Terry Rozier and LaMelo Ball wound up with north of 20 points apiece but neither shot the ball efficiently. The duo combined to shoot 15-47, just under 32%, from the field — not going to cut it in the postseason.

On the other hand, PJ Washington came through when his team needed him too. Washington is rarely selfish, letting shots come to him rather than seeking out poor ones on his own accord. So he’s usually taking good shots, and did so Wednesday night. He made 7-10 shots and three of five 3s for an efficient 17 points, also adding six rebounds, two assists and two blocks.

As I talked about in the Play-In Preview the other day, Charlotte is treading water with another Play-In loss. Their season ended in this exact same game a season ago. In 2022, they improved their record significantly, but unfortunately, so did the rest of the East, resulting in another Play-In appearance. And they were unlucky to run into a Hawks team that is finally shaping into form.

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Johnson gets going late in Spurs loss to Pelicans

Keldon Johnson rode a streak of nine straight 20-point games heading into San Antonio’s postseason clash with the Pelicans on Wednesday. Then he blanked his first seven shots and had zero made field goals at halftime of his team’s elimination game. Gulp. Between he and Karl-Anthony Towns, some rough scenes for UK guys in the Play-In round.

But KJ is no cynic. He doesn’t let failure get his head down, and he kept attacking in the second half when a lot of other players may have hesitated to stay aggressive. When San Antonio faced its largest deficit of the game in the third quarter, down 85-64, Johnson scored six straight right at the hoop to reinvigorate the Spurs.

They fell down by 21 again in the fourth quarter and Johnson was there with the response to kickstart another San Antonio run. He scored six points in two minutes to help cut the lead back to 13, before it became just six a few minutes later. Unfortunately, that was as close as the Spurs came to making the comeback, but at least Johnson and co. put up a fight after falling down big.

Johnson’s streak of 20-point games came to an end, as did his season, but the third-year forward took tremendous strides in 2021-22. Alongside Dejounte Murray, San Antonio has two pillars to build around going forward.

Statistics

Player	Result	Points	FG(3PA)	Rebounds	Assists	Steals	Blocks	Turnovers	Minutes	+/-
PJ Washington (CHA)	132-103 L @ ATL	17	7-10 (3-5)	6	2	1	2	0	38	-18
Keldon Johnson (SAS)	113-103 L @ NOP	15	6-20 (0-5)	5	4	0	0	1	40	-2
Kevin Knox (ATL)	132-103 W vs. CHA	0	0-0 (0-0)	1	1	0	0	0	2	+3