Kristaps Porzingis (above) and the Atlanta Hawks dropped a game to the Denver Nuggets on Friday night at State Farm Arena. Photo by Donnell Suggs/The Atlanta Voice Atlanta Hawks forward Jalen Johnson is on pace to be named to his first All-Star team. What he did on Friday night against one of th e best teams in the Western Conference might have made the case for him. Johnson had a triple-double at halftime of the Hawks’ 134-133 loss to the Denver Nuggets at State Farm Arena. Photo by Dionnell Suggs/The Atlanta Voice It was Divine Nine night, an annual celebration of the Black fraternities and sororities, and the Hawks got off to a divine start. Atlanta went ahead by as much as 18 points during the first quarter and 21 points during the second quarter. Along with Johnson’s stellar play (21 points, 18 rebounds, and 16 assists), first-year Hawks forward Kristaps Porzingis (25 points in 20 minutes returned from a long stretch of DNP-Injury games to spark the second unit off the bench. Porzingis had several second-half three-pointers that helped the Hawks keep the Nuggets from taking the lead until it wasn’t enough. “This one hurts. They all hurt, but particularly how this one happened,” Hawks head coach Quin Snyder said after the game. “It needs to be affirming for us that when we play the way we want to play, we’re a pretty good team. When we don’t, we can go in the other direction.” Denver stars Nikola Jokic (40 points) and Jamal Murray (23 points) led the Nuggets back to their first lead of the game since they were ahead 6-5 in the first quarter. Murray’s jumper gave the Nuggets a 108-106 lead at the eight-minute mark of the fourth quarter. Photo by Donnell Suggs/The Atlanta Voice Hawks guard Nikeil Alexander-Walker (30 points, 5-10 from three) and Porzingis continued to make plays for Atlanta late in the game, but defensively, the Hawks didn’t get any critical stops once Denver got rolling. Tim Hardaway, Jr. (17 points) and Bruce Brown (13 points) made huge baskets for the Nuggets during the second half. Former All-Star guard Trae Young was on the bench in civilian clothing on Friday night. Young isn’t expected back for another week or so. When he does come back, he will be joining a team three games over .500 and playing with a lot of confidence. That said, they will need a closer to be able to secure key baskets in close games, such as the loss to Denver on Friday. The Hawks will be in Washington to play the Wizards for the second time this season on Saturday night. The last time the Atlanta Hawks visited Washington, D.C., they allowed 132 points to what was then the worst team in the National Basketball Association. The Hawks not only lost that November 25 game by 19 points, but also allowed Wizards guard and former All-Star CJ McCollum to score a game-high 46 points, and gave up 45 first-quarter points in the process.  “We know how we played there last time, we know how they played, and we’ve got to be ready to go,” Snyder said. The post ‘This one hurts’: Hawks fall to Nuggets 134-133 behind 40 points from Jokic appeared first on The Atlanta Voice. ...read more read less