Daily Dime: The NBAs newest (and loudest) fanatics

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ATLANTA -- It's becoming a familiar theme:

See Hawks fall behind.

See Atlanta make a run.

See the Philips Arena crowd whip the team into a frenzy as the Hawks rally to beat Boston.

Friday's 103-100 Hawks win was the third straight time that's happened in Atlanta, and it has the Hawks on the cusp of one of the biggest upsets in the history of sports ... and the Celtics on the brink of one of the greatest failures. Although the Hawks won a mere 37 games this year and the mighty Celtics a league-best 66, the series is tied at 3-3 heading into Sunday's rubber match in Boston.

"From day one I told this team that anything is possible when you get into the playoffs," said Hawks coach Mike Woodson, "and this team believes that."

They were about the only ones, but after again watching Boston crumble in the fourth quarter at Philips Arena, one has to wonder how they'll react to having all the pressure on them on Sunday. Unbelievably, the Hawks scored points on 16 straight possessions in the second half against Boston's vaunted defense to rally from an eight-point deficit.

Yet the Hawks' series-tying win may be only the second-biggest upset of the night. While the media that covered the team all year looked around and thought, "Where am I?" a towel-waving mob upped the Philips Arena decibel level to heights never before seen in this building. Of the five arenas I've been to in this postseason, Philips was easily the loudest -- a shocking turn of events for a place that could have doubled as a mausoleum for much of the regular season.

Where all these people came from, nobody knows -- it was an arena record 20,425 of them, to be precise -- but the newfound fanatics carried the team. They quite possibly intimidated the refs too: The Hawks enjoyed a 47-25 free throw advantage and took 41 in the final three quarters. Included in that tally was a dubious sixth foul on Paul Pierce with 4:44 left that he magnified with a technical foul, putting the Hawks up by seven points and taking Boston's best crunch-time scorer off the floor.

"Them shooting 47 free throws to us shooting 25 makes it a tough game to win," said Celtics coach Doc Rivers in his best fine-avoiding voice. "Paul being in foul trouble late in the game really hurt us."

Fittingly, it was Zaza Pachulia who drew the sixth foul on Pierce. A target of boo birds during a disappointing regular season, he again was huge off the bench in an Atlanta win, with nine points, six rebounds and two steals. His play helped offset a foul-plagued evening from Josh Smith.

The inspired effort came after Woodson challenged Pachulia after the Game 5 loss -- a team source told me his only substantive comment to the team was to express his disbelief that Pachulia didn't get a single rebound. The two have had a testy relationship all season, with Pachulia getting suspended earlier this year after one confrontation, but this time the Georgian big man responded.

"I thought Zaza and Josh Childress played huge for us," said Woodson. "Zaza bounced back from the game in Boston where I didn't think he played well, but I thought he responded beautifully tonight, both rebounding and making some shots, and I thought he did an excellent job on Garnett."

Pachulia also got the crowd even more lathered up during a timeout in the fourth quarter, when a clip played of Atlanta's newest cult hero in a Rocky sweatshirt interspersed with his Game 4 staredown with Kevin Garnett. The team filmed it this morning on the practice court, and went on a 10-3 run immediately after it was shown on the board.

Josh Smith, who grew up in the Atlanta area before coming to the Hawks out of high school, said he'd never seen the arena this loud.

"This is the first time, for these three games," said Smith. "I mean, the fans have been outstanding. I can't say enough about those people. They just give us so much joy and so much motivation to go out there and try to make things happen."

Of course, Atlanta still faces a daunting task. The Hawks won't have those fans with them in Boston, and they lost their first three games there by 23, 19 and 25 points.

Worse, Atlanta may be without the services of Marvin Williams. He sprained his left knee in the fourth quarter, apparently bending it sideways, and although he made a brief return with 10.6 seconds left, he didn't appear to move well and Kevin Garnett scored very easily over him to cut the margin to two points.

Williams said he'll give it a go in Game 7, but one wonders if he'll be too limited to contribute much. If so it would be a huge blow, as he was the key player Friday.

With the Celtics doubling Joe Johnson at every opportunity and forcing the Hawks to beat them with secondary players, it was Williams on the backside who was left open. Time after time he either had an open mid-range jumper or a chance to drive with a mismatch, and he ended up with a series-high 18 points while only missing three shots.

"We wanted to fight the double-team early. When they doubled me, I kicked the ball to my teammates to make the play. I looked for Marvin Williams early on [when] the double-teams [came] and he hit some big shots."

Forced into a decoy role, Johnson saved his best for last. After taking a couple dribbles and head-faking James Posey, his fadeaway 3-pointer with 1:07 left put Atlanta up by five -- providing a dagger on a night when he shot just 4-for-13 overall, not to mention the Hawks' only 3-pointer of the night.

"I knew Posey would go for the pump fake because he was crowding me all game," said Johnson. "I just wanted to get a good look, and I knew it was good when it left my hands."

The surrealness of this series went a step further afterward when Pachulia yelled, "We going to game 7" into the mic and the fans roared their approval, chanting "seven" as they headed to the exits. During the post-game press conferences, you could hear horns honking outside the arena.

The only thing you couldn't do was make sense of it. Yet it's really happening, and we're one game away from a jaw-dropping upset as a result.