It's beginning to look a lot like the NBA regular season is effectively over. Rather than sit around and wait for basketball to come back into our lives, let's reflect on what the season has dished up to this point.

We'll take a look at each and every NBA team over the coming weeks, assessing what went right, what didn't go to plan, and where their journey took them as well as where the team hoped it would take them.

Today, we'll examine three teams that had expectations that far outweighed their eventual production: the Atlanta Hawks, Detroit Pistons and New York Knicks.

Atlanta Hawks

Record: 20-47 (14^th in the Eastern Conference)

82 game pace: 25-57

Expectations

The Hawks felt like they had a legitimate chance of pushing for the 8^th seed at the start of the season. The talent was there in the transcendent young star Trae Young, supported by John Collins and Kevin Huerter; a pair of solid rookies in Cam Reddish and De’Andre Hunter; veteran talent in Jabari Parker, Allen Crabbe and Evan Turner. In a shallow conference, why couldn’t they at least be in the race?

What went right

Trae Young most certainly went right. The 2^nd year dynamo finished in the NBA’s top ten with 29.6 points (4^th in the league), 9.3 assists (2^nd), 3.4 made threes (8^th) and…ummm…turnovers (1^st). Offensively, he was the lone bright spot for large swathes of the season, leading to his first All Star selection and the legitimisation of the Trae/Luka trade debate.

When John Collins played, he was a wonderful, versatile, 2^nd banana. He put up 21.6 points, 10.1 rebounds, 1.6 blocks and 1.4 three pointers at over 40%.

Once GM Travis Schlenk addressed the teams depth issues (that were in fairness created by Schlenk himself), the team started to gel, with a 5-6 record from the All Star Break to the shutdown.

The returning Jeff Teague gave the team solid play at the point guard spot for all 48 minutes. Dewayne Dedmon didn’t shoot the ball particularly well, but his gravity opened up the floor for Young and Collins, whilst his defense remained robust.

What went wrong

The first half of the season was a serious Young injury away from being the absolute worst case scenario.

They lost Collins to a PED suspension early in the season. Parker filled in well at one end of the court but predictably hurt the team at the other. Huerter missed 11 straight games in November, with the team losing the first 10 of those.

Turner was completely at sea as the backup point guard and as a result Atlanta cratered in minutes without Young on the court. Alex Len reverted to the mean; well, his mean at least. The NBA mean is a lot better than the best version of Len. The less said about Crabbe’s minutes the better.

The rookies both struggles out of the gate. Hunter was one of the least efficient players in the league through January, although he did pick it up post All Star break. Reddish looked utterly over matched until a sharp spike in form from mid February.

The outcome

Sure, the record is not what the franchise had hoped for coming into the season, but if you break the season into two parts, the pre All Star section was Murphy’s Law where practically nothing went right; the post All Star section was the plan coming to fruition.

Atlanta have young pieces and reasonable depth across the roster, all of a sudden. The core of Young, Collins, Huerter, Hunter, Reddish and Clint Capela is probably, health permitting, a playoff team in next season’s Eastern conference.

Detroit Pistons

Record: 20-46 (13^th in Western Conference)

82 game pace: 25-57

Expectations

The Pistons are like Pinky and the Brain, except their goals are far more humble: try to scrape into the playoffs.

In fairness, that was a realistic goal for the veteran laden team. Markeiff Morris and the rejuvenated Derrick Rose joined Andre Drummond, Blake Griffin and Reggie Jackson to form a solid if uninspiring nucleus: luckily for Pistons fans 'solid if uninspiring' is a recipe for a 7^th seed in the East.

Detroit also had some young talent in Luke Kennard, Bruce Brown, Khyri Thomas and Sekou Doumbouya to supplement the vets.

What went right

Rose continued his resurrection, with 18.1 points and 5.6 assists per night. Importantly, he appeared in fifty games. Kennard looked great until an injury in late December finished his season.

The big positive for Detroit was the emergence of Christian Wood. The much travelled big man finally found a home in the Motor City, growing into a solid back up through the early part of the campaign. His ascension allowed the team to cut bait with Andre Drummond and once Wood stepped in as the starting centre he flourished: 22.6 points, 10.7 boards, 1.1 blocks and 1.7 makes from range. He’s still fragile on defense (he’s painfully thin) but is active and springy, partially making up for that lack of brute strength.

What went wrong

As the old saying goes: if you aim for the moon and miss, you'll still land amongst the stars. The Pistons aimed for the 8^th seed and missed. They did not land amongst the stars.

The most obvious thing to go wrong for Detroit was the veterans. Griffin's revival last season was lovely, but his body just couldn't get going this time around. He missed the first 10 games off the season, and looked stilted in the 18 games he did play. Just after Christmas, he was shut down.

Jackson missed 42 straight games at one point, before being bought out after the trade deadline. Morris was also bought out. He was a solid contributor but didn't set the world ablaze in Michigan.

All of those buyouts were of course set in motion by the salary dump of franchise centrepiece Drummond to Cleveland for a six pack of light beer and a bag of pretzels. Drummond continues to put up some wonderful rebounding and steal numbers, but the idea of him being a good team's #1 option has long passed.

The outcome

It looks like Detroit has finally – belatedly – embraced the concept of a rebuild. Some good young pieces are already in place in Wood, Kennard and Brown. They'll have some juicy picks over the coming years, you would expect. Rose is a steady hand to guide the youngsters. As is Griffin, if he ever gets healthy.

You'll see a lot of chatter about how the team needs to trade Blake's contract, but it's hard to envision a scenario where that happens. The team would have to attach so much capital to shed Griffin's deal that it wouldn't be worth it for a rebuilding side. The Pistons will have to swallow their medicine on this one.

Not that it matters in the long run. By the time Detroit is ready to make some noise, that contract will be expiring.

New York Knicks

Record: 21-45 (12^th in the Eastern Conference)

82 game pace: 26-56

Expectations

For some reason, the Knicks held high hopes of a playoff berth this season. Silly Knicks!

Look, we know by now that New York is home to the Most Famous Arena in the World, and that arena hosts the Most Deranged Professional Basketball Team in the World.

Still, you would think that in the pace'n'space era, playing a series of ground bound power forwards with no shooting range together would probably not have worked. Especially when you give them the worst jump shooting back court in the NBA, and a heralded top 3 draft selection that isn't exactly the 2^nd coming of Klay Thompson. Still, Kicks gonna Knick.

What went right

Mitchell Robinson was again the lone true bright spot in New York. The 23 year old pogo stick put up 9.7 points, 7 rebounds and 2 blocks in under 24 minutes a night. His astronomical foul rate was, well, still astronomical but it was much improved from his rookie campaign.

Robinson still blocked shots, but didn't go hunting the rejection so much, and therefore helped his team maintain it's defensive shape. His 74.2% FG% will be an all time NBA record. Sure, his shooting range can be measures in inches, but why shoot jumpers when catching lobs is so easy?

There were also sporadic signs of life from rookie RJ Barrett and guards Frank Ntilikina and Elfrid Payton, whilst Julius Randle put up (mostly empty) numbers.

What went wrong

The Knicks had enough go wrong that we could make a 10 part Netflix series, and still have enough material to think of a 2^nd series. So lets focus on the bigger stuff.

The team make up was horrible. Marcus Morris (who was traded mid season) aside, literally nobody on this team was a legitimate threat to score from the outside. That lack of spacing took away from what literally all of their best players do well. Payton couldn't work the pick and roll, Dennis Smith had no driving lanes, Randle and Barrett ran into constant double teams. Robinson had to jump over multiple bodies to get rebounds and putbacks. Kevin Knox runs the very real risk of being out of the league before his rookie scale contract expires. He just doesn't seem to do anything well.

Coach David Fizdale looked completely overwhelmed by the task that was placed in front of him. Making the playoffs with this roster is the equivalent of giving a MasterChef contestant some rice, mince meat, a mouldy apple and a clove of garlic and saying 'make me a croquembouche'.

When the team power brokers Steve Mills and Scott Perry gave an impromptu and utterly ridiculous press conference a mere ten games into the season, Fizdale knew he was on the block. He pretty much mailed it in from that point. To the team's credit, interim coach Mike Miller has looked good. So of course some person who goes by the name of Steve Stoute – who may or may not work for the team – threw Miller under the bus in a calamitous interview on First Take.

Then there are the ongoing court side controversies, be it with megafan Spike Lee, beloved former player Charles Oakley, or Regular Joe fans calling out owner James Dolan. When the whole stadium wants you to...