As we begin play this evening, the Hawks are five games out of the 8th spot in the East. With only 15 games left, that's a pretty huge margin. Still, it would be nice to at least put some pressure on the teams in front of us.

Sacramento is a beatable team, but not one we can just show up and expect to dominate (not that such a team exists in the NBA). They beat us in Sacto earlier this season when we were without JJ and Josh Childress among others. We are without Joe now as well, of course, but there are still positive memories of last week's four-game home winning streak.

In breaking down tonight's game today with Hawks assistant David Fizdale, he said the Kings will be daring us to beat them from outside. That being the case, I look for big performances from Marvin Williams and Salim Stoudamire, our two best perimeter threats in Joe's absence.

I am interested to see the match-up between the Kings' Kevin Martin and Josh Childress, mostly because each of them manages to shoot well from the field despite two of the most unconventional (read: ugly) releases in the NBA.

In other news, we have posted a survey on the Hawks site to get your feedback on how we do on this here Internet thing. Please take a few minutes and fill it out - you can win four tickets to the game against the Bulls on April 1 (and no, that's not a cruel April Fool's joke). Seriously, we strive to give you the things you want over here at Hawks.com, so any information you can give us about your preferences will help to make the site get better and better.

Finally, just a reminder - if you can't make the game tonight due to any legitimate reason (birth of your first child, let's say), remember you can check it out in HD tonight, one of three Hawks games being shown in high-def over the course of these few weeks. It should be pretty sweet. Otherwise, get down to Philips and let's see if the Hawks can't get a season-high fifth straight home win!

See you there!