Quin Snyder and Trae Young’s Rapport Has Been Essential To The Hawks’ Success

The Atlanta Hawks sit at the seventh spot in the Eastern Conference with a 13-12 record. This is after the Hawks reeled in six straight wins before losing in a blowout to the Dallas Mavericks this past Sunday.

As expected, Hawks guard, Trae Young, helped lead the team during the winning streak. What stood out was how he lead the team.

Instead of Young being depended on for generating points with his scoring, he helped guide the team through his precision passing and leadership.

Head coach Quin Snyder has noticed the difference in Young this year and says that the trust he has in him is credited to their relationship.

“There’s trust, I think that’s the main thing,” stated Snyder. “Trae is wanting to be coach. And I try to do that…and some of that for him is his game, his role evolving. It’s not like I’m asking him to do anything completely different. You’re going to have better nights than others but he’s really bought in to that evolution.”

Snyder has been an advocate for Young and speaks highly of his leadership qualities and how his game has evolved.

The young players has benefitted the most from this. He’s helped their confidence by showing confidence in them and giving advice and direction when he sees fit to.

Snyder applauds Young for having to adjust his approach for the team’s sake and realizes that it can be difficult doing that.

“A player that’s had a lot of success, to be able to do that at a certain point of your career is hard,” said Snyder. “You have habits, you have expectations so he’s really had to focus in on that and he has.”

Young also believes his relationship with Snyder has built trust within each other for the better.

“I got a lot of trust in Quin [Snyder]. Stuff we talk about all the time, it’s not very many days we don’t talk, even off days,” Young stated, “I think the communications we have has been great and we’ve been able to really learn each other really well. I feel like that’s been a key to our success for sure.”

Their relationship has translated to the court during the game. The ability to be able to be in sync with each other allows them to be on one accord and have Young relay to his teammates what Snyder wants.

Young teammates have noticed the change in his approach, particularly Bogdan Bogdanovic.

“It’s unbelievable what he’s doing, to change. And I know he’s not playing to the level he know that he can,” Bogdanovic said. “He will get there. His adjustment was one of the biggest one for sure. We need Trae to be Trae. His leadership development has gotten better. He’s talking more, he’s engaged more and we’re happy about that.”

The camaraderie of the coach and point guard has helped catapulted the team into the NBA Cup quarterfinal game against the New York Knicks on Wednesday. It remains to be seen how the two and the team can build on this throughout the season.