Jalen Johnson played only the first half of the Atlanta Hawks’ 120-111 preseason road loss to the Miami Heat on Wednesday night. But the 2020-21 Duke basketball one-and-done’s 17 minutes as a starter were all he needed to post a team-high 21 points in the contest.
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The 6-foot-9, 220-pound forward from Wisconsin, now entering his fourth NBA campaign after getting drafted No. 20 overall by the Hawks in 2021, finished 8-for-9 from the field, 4-for-4 from three, and 1-for-1 at the charity stripe. He added five rebounds, four assists, and one steal.
Through Atlanta’s 1-2 start to its preseason slate, Johnson has averaged 16.7 points, 7.3 rebounds, and 2.0 steals in only 23.0 minutes per outing. Even more impressive, the mere 22-year-old is shooting 69.0 percent from the field, 87.5 percent beyond the arc, and 100.0 percent at the foul line.
Last season, Jalen Johnson played 56 games and averaged 16.0 points, almost tripling his scoring average from his sophomore campaign in the league. He chipped in a career-high 8.7 rebounds, 3.6 assists, and 1.2 steals per game.
Johnson and the Hawks, whose head coach is late-1980s Duke basketball point guard and 1990s Blue Devil assistant Quin Snyder, wrap up their preseason action with a road bout against the Oklahoma City Thunder at 8 p.m. ET Thursday. Their regular season gets underway with a home game against the Brooklyn Nets at 7:30 p.m. ET next Wednesday.
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