Cleveland Cavaliers @ Orlando Magic, Thu, Jan 29, 2009

Magic scouting report

• You just love the way the Magic plays: full of team work, fluid ball movement, totally unselfish. Their basic strategy is either to shoot the 3 or get the ball to Dwight Howard inside to work it out. They have excellent outside shooters in Lewis, Turkoglu and recently Jameer Nelson. They would use a simple screen in the high post to get the shooters open; alternatively, they would drive and kick and find some open looks. And their shooters never fail to deliver.
• DH12 is basically unstoppable in the paint, esp. against the half-dead, half-retired Ben Wallace, or the Flop King Varejao. He remains a monster in rebounds.
• Turk is the designated point forward, in particular when he was leading the second unit. Never an athletic player, he possesses strong basketball IQ and did a nice job in initiating offense. His shots were a bit off today, but he still scored 19 pts and he still hit a couple of tough shots. Surprisingly he is a very solid rebounder (11 boards).
• All-star reserve Rashard Lewis is a smooth shooter who could score everywhere: outside shots, 3s and post-up turnaround Js.
• Another all-star reserve Jameer Nelson is a tough cookie. For sure he’s not a prototype PG, he does not focus on dishing or setting up teammates but that’s because the Magic’s system does not rely too much on the PG’s brilliance but overall teamwork. Instead, Nelson drives hard to the rim, scored on mid range J or 3s. In fact, IMHO, it was Nelson’s timely outside shots (4-for-6 3-pt) that have killed the Cavaliers.
• Rookie Courtney Lee is a very serviceable role player. He plays hard and runs hard. Scored a couple of shots, esp. a beautiful fastbreak layup in which he managed to hang in the air long enough to get away with LBJ’s hands and scored on reverse.
• Yes, they are not deep on the bench, but both Pietrus and Anthony Johnson did a not-so-spectacular but nonetheless serviceable job. I could hardly see Tony Battie play though.
• As for defense, the Magic played very sloppy defense in the first half, failing to rotate and many a time ended up leaving the Cavs wide open in the paint. At the same time, they were not able to slow down the wing players. However, they tightened up their D late in Q3 and throughout Q4, forced a few turnovers, made a couple of steals, and then they hit a few 3s, and a few fastbreak baskets and just like that, they had a 20-2 run which ended up leading by 99-74 pts with 5.20 mins left. The rest is history. No, they were not able to shut down LBJ, but at least they were successful in preventing LBJ from driving the lane, and the King always settled for outside jumpshots. And he was not sharp tonight.
• Just for this night, the Magic looks like a legitimate title contender and kudos to Coach Stan Van Gundy for his ability to maximize the output of his not-so-complete roster by taking advantage of the special skills of his players.