John Wall Leads Washington Wizards To First-Round Playoff Sweep
John Wall led the Washington Wizards to a first-round sweep in the 2015 NBA Playoffs. Wall led the Wizards into the second-round during the 2013-14 NBA season as well, but the team fell just short of making the Eastern Conference Finals. After beating up on the Toronto Raptors in Game 4 of the first-round series Sunday afternoon (April 26), the Wizards seem primed to make an even bigger push this year.
The Wizards jumped out to a huge first-half lead over the Raptors, allowing the starters to play limited minutes in the second half. By halftime, the score was already 68-50 in favor of the Wizards, and it got even worse when they out-scored the Raptors 36-20 in the third quarter alone. The final score was 124-95 in favor of the No. 5 seeded Wizards, and the team got to do it in front of their home crowd.
John Wall had 14 points, 10 assists, and four rebounds, in just over 25 minutes of work. For the series, he averaged 17.3 points, 12.5 assists, and four rebounds per game. He averaged just under 40 minutes per game, showing how valuable it was to have him on the court nearly every night. Even though his field goal percentage showed some room for improvement (38.9 percent), he commanded control of each game against the Raptors.
As previously reported on the Inquisitr, the Washington Wizards will now take on the winner of the No. 1 vs. No. 8 series. That match-up has the Atlanta Hawks playing the Brooklyn Nets. The Hawks had been up 2-0 in the series, but just lost Game 3 over the weekend while in New York. The teams will play Game 4 on Monday night (April 27), dictating that the Wizards could be waiting a little while for this series to conclude.
Though John Wall was certainly the leader of this series, it was a team effort that got the Washington Wizards past the Toronto Raptors so quickly. Game 4 was a good example of that, as seven players scored in double-figures. That included 23 points by Bradley Beal, 21 points and 11 rebounds by Marcin Gortat, and 14 points by Paul Pierce. Beal averaged 44 minutes per game through the first three in the series, and finished the four games with averages of 21.3 points, 5.0 rebounds, and 4.0 assists per game. The tandem of Wall and Beal were nearly unstoppable.
During the regular season, John Wall averaged 21 points per game against the Atlanta Hawks, and had much worse numbers against the Brooklyn Nets. Even though the Hawks are a No. 1 seed in the 2015 NBA Playoffs, the Washington Wizards might just match up better with them than the No. 8 seeded Brooklyn Nets.
[Image Source: Win McNamee/Getty Images]
