Before the Orlando Magic face off against the Los Angeles Clippers tonight, I was able to speak briefly with head coach Stan Van Gundy amongst the media.
Here's what he had to say:
What type of challenges do you anticipate the Los Angeles Clippers giving your team in tonight's game?
Well, I mean, first of all they've made a dramatic turnaround. I mean, through the first 52 games of the year until they made the trade, they didn't shoot many threes, didn't make many threes, and they didn't shoot them very well. I mean, they were one of the worst shooting teams in the league and then all of a sudden, changing philosophy maybe coaching-wise, plus the addition of [Travis] Outlaw and [Steve] Blake in the trade, [Al] Thornton - who didn't shoot many threes - going out, they've now over the last 11 games been one of the best three-point shooting teams in the league.
They've gone from making under five a game to making eight and a half a game, which would put them third or fourth in the league if it were over the course of a year. They've gone from shooting 31% from three to 38% from three so they've really added a huge element of three-point shooting to a great low-post game, which is also been improved, so they've added a low post guy ... [Chris] Kaman is already there, and now they've added [Drew] Gooden who you have to come down on, and now they've added more shooting, Blake in place of [Sebastian] Telfair, Outlaw getting minutes in place of Thornton, so offensively they're a much, much better team than they were before the trade so we've got to do a good job on their post-ups, we've got to do a good job on obviously Baron [Davis'] pick and rolls, and try to keep the ball out of the paint but then the element that's been added is you go to do all that and then you have to be able to close and limit their three-point shots, which has obviously been a big problem for us over the course of a year. The only real, on a consistent basis, bad part of our defense.
You've been adding some plays to your offense recently, like the pick and roll with Jameer Nelson and Vince Carter. Do you anticipate adding any more plays before the playoffs start?
Yeah, you always add stuff and we'll continue to add. Quite honestly, most of what you put in doesn't work and so you add it, then you get rid of it. You just keep trying to find stuff that might actually help you a little bit so some of what I've put in, I like, and then other stuff I'll see it a couple of times, I don't like it, and I'll put in something else.