Streaking Hawks roll, increase lead in East

The streaking Atlanta Hawks made it look easy against the Washington Wizards. “At this point, I don’t think we’ve played a better game,” guard Kyle Korver said. “We had that six-minute stretch in the second quarter, but otherwise that’s about as good as we’ve done this year.” Korver scored 19 points and DeMarre Carroll added 16 to help the Eastern Conference-leading Hawks win their eighth game in a row, 120-89 Sunday against visiting Washington. Improving to 16-3 at home and 29-8 overall, the Hawks got 15 points from Al Horford and 11 each from Paul Millsap, Jeff Teague and Mike Scott. Teague finished with a game-high 10 assists. Atlanta has won 13 of 14 and 22 of 24. It leads the Eastern Conference this late in the season for the first time in 21 years. Aggressively defending Washington from the opening tipoff, the Hawks kept the sellout crowd — their fourth in the past five home games — engaged. “This is my eighth year, and I’ve never seen us like this besides the playoffs,” Horford said. “I feel like the fans are starting to come out, they’re starting to believe and it’s exciting to see. We have a good team and we need their support.” John Wall had 15 points for Washington and Nene added 14. The Wizards were outscored, 33-12, in the fourth quarter. They won their previous three games, but allowed a seasonhigh margin of victory for Atlanta. Korver was 5 for 7 from 3-point range, improving his NBA-leading percentage to 50.2. His smoothest move, however, was a behind-theback pass to Carroll for a layup and a 64-54 lead in the third. “Well, I was thinking about trying to dunk it and then I saw John Wall,” Korver said, smiling. “I’ve seen too many highlights of him getting blocks from behind.” The Wizards, who never led, pulled within two points on Wall’s 20-footer with 5:46 left in the third quarter. They nearly rallied from a 20-point deficit by stepping in the Hawks’ passing lanes, blocking their paths to the basket and limiting their offensive rebounds. The Hawks scored 31 points off 20 Washington turnovers. “They cause turnovers, they cause deflections, they stay within their principles and they just run,” Wizards forward Paul Pierce said. “They keep coming offensively. They shoot the ball, they keep moving. They had better discipline than us tonight.” The Wizards dropped four games behind Atlanta in the Southeast Division. Other games Heat 104, Clippers 90: Chris Bosh scored 34 points and Hassan Whiteside had career highs of 23 points and 16 rebounds as visiting Miami beat Los Angeles to end a three-game road skid. Dwyane Wade added 17 points on 5-of-15 shooting and had 10 assists. Grizzlies 122, Suns 110: Zach Randolf scored 27 points with 17 rebounds to lead Memphis past visiting Phoenix in a double-overtime win. Marc Gasol scored seven of his 12 points in the second overtime to seal the win. Kings 103, Cavaliers 84: DeMarcus Cousins had 26 points and Rudy Gay added 23 as host Sacramento blitzed Cleveland.