ATLANTA — The Atlanta Hawks beat the Orlando Magic 115-112 on Wednesday night without one of the team's best players.
Clint Capela missed the game with what seems to be a surprising injury. Kevin Chouinard, a writer for the Hawks official site, tweeted Wednesday before tipoff that Interim Head Coach Nate McMillian said Capela had a right foot injury and could possibly have to sit out. Less than 30 minutes later, Chouinard tweeted that Capela was officially out.
Brad Rowland, the host of the daily Locked On Hawks podcast, discussed the surprise news that caused Capela to miss game action.
“Clint Capela missed this game. He was listed as questionable with right foot pain in the afternoon then was downgraded to doubtful and then was ruled out when the game started," Rowland said.
Capela averages 14.7 points and 14.2 rebounds per game this season. Both of these marks are higher than his career average. Over the course of his career, he’s averaged 12.4 points and 10.1 rebounds per game.
Even without Capela, the Hawks managed to pull off the victory. Trae Young scored 32 points and hit the go-ahead free throws with eight seconds remaining. The Hawks rallied from 19 down in the second half to beat the Magic by just thee points.
Coupled with Tuesday’s win in Miami, the Hawks improved to 2-0 under McMillan and won consecutive games for the first time in 5 1/2 weeks. McMillan took over Monday when Lloyd Pierce was fired.
Listen to the podcast below.
Locked On is a podcast network for local sports that produces daily podcasts about major professional sports leagues, as well as some college sports programs.