Orlando Magic 88, Atlanta Hawks 82

Dwight showed me how dedicated he is to winning if i already didnt know. Made me proud to be a Magic fan. They fought and got the W.

Great recap, though.

it wasn’t all bad either. the TO’s not hitting shots, leaving guys open. look we all know this is gonna be a good long series, but it doesn’t have to be. only if the magic get there act together. they are getting good looks, but aren’t making them thus always having the games close for the opponents to try to win.j-rich and hedo are going to have to start being more aggressive. and howard needs to take care of the ball. sighs bring on game 3.

The 34.6% the Magic shot from the field marks the lowest they’ve shot from the field in a post-season win, while the 9 total assists by the Magic is a franchise low in a playoff game.

The 52 total rebounds was the fourth highest in a game in Magic postseason history, while the 20 offensive rebounds tied for the second highest in a game in Magic posteseason history.

The Atlanta guard trio of Johnson, Hinrich, and Crawford combined to score 48 points on 18 of 44 shooting (40.9%) which was down considerably from their combined 61 points on 22 of 40 shooting (55%) in Game 1.

Great defense from the Magic in the second and third quarters, as they held the Hawks to just 32 points on 12 of 40 shooting (30%) during that time.

The Magic were able to survive 30.6% second half shooting thanks to their strong defense and rebounding, and, of course, Dwight Howard, who has scored more than 30 points in two consecutive playoff games for the first time in his career.

I really hope the shots start falling for them

But i’m glad that ball wasn’t in his hands in the 2nd half. If the seasons on the line, i’d rather have it in Jameer or Hedo’s hands.

the Magic played some pretty tenacious D in this game. Hopefully they can keep up the same intensity moving forward in these playoffs.

…courtesy of the Yahoo! Sports post-game recap:

“It’s not anything I did – our guys did it. You gotta get out and take the challenge. … Every game sort of takes on a life of its own and you just gotta do whatever it takes to get the win on that night.”

Jason Collins receiving so much importance in this series is worrying though. Eventually though, we’ll get these games where the team shoots 40% from downtown. The only problem is… all too often the team ends up giving 42% to the other team.

Like Dwight said, this is about defense

Richardson and Bass’s exceptionally poor play. It was much better this game, but nowhere near inspiring enough to think the Magic have a chance against, well an actual good team. I hope they can turn it around in time to beat Atlanta and give the next team something to at least partially worry about.

that Richardson seems to always hit that three that the Magic need most but miss otherwise? Strange..maybe he needs to start pretending there’s less than a minute to go in a close game everytime he shoots.

The new acquisitions went 8-31 (25.8%) from the field, which is an even worse showing than Game 1. They combined for 20 points (23% of the team’s output), which is reasonable for a SG/SF/backup PG on a team with Dwight Howard and a shoot-first point guard. They also combined to go just 1-2 from the FT line (Turkoglu) and committed 4 turnovers (actually a pretty low number considering the usage).

Jason Richardson’s complete unwillingness to draw contact is really disappointing, and he has yet to even attempt a free throw all series. I know the dangers of using raw +/- stats for individuals, but the Magic were -4 with J-Rich and +13 with his backup J.J. Redick (4-5 from the line). So, Richardson is being solidly outplayed by his still-recovering backup, and I will say again that it’d be a further waste of money to re-sign him after this season.

Also awful: Gilbert Arenas, who is so terrible at the game of basketball that he played only 6 minutes (during which the team was -11) and was promptly benched for the rest of the game.

A BRIGHT SPOT! Hedo Turkoglu, shooting aside, played well. He rescued the ball-handling duties from the incompetence of Arenas and Duhon, and he finally looked a little more aggressive and less dead. Hopefully this is a sign of things to come, especially now that he’s resumed his backup-PG role from the Finals run of 2009. But even with Turkoglu’s contributions….this team’s offense just is so bad. So so so so so so so bad.

It was great to taste victory though! A 2-0 hole in this series would’ve been especially soul-crushing for me.

And to round out the Tradewatch, Earl Clark recorded his second straight DNP-CD, because offense is not included in his skill set.

When these guys want to, they play ferocious defense. I mean they locked down Atlanta for 3 quarters. After that JJ steal and pass, do we all realize that single play might have saved the season???, the Magic put the clamps on Atlanta. The team is capable. Also, that game should not have been close. The magic missed at least 10-14 wide open shots. Maybe more. Even 40% of those go in and Orlando wins by 10-15 points. So for one night, I think we can stop worrying about Dwight leaving, SVG getting fired, and the end of the city of Orlando as we know it.

But I was really impressed by the defense, even when we were behind. The Hawks were going iso but just getting absolutely no space or time to make shots, they constantly had hands in their faces. There’s just nothing you can do about a guy hitting a 35 foot three pointer with half a second left on the shot clock, which was about all Atlanta’s offense could manage most of the time.

Howard was a monster in the first half and the rest of the team found just about enough in the second half to get Orlando over the line. I think we were probably a bit lucky that Horford got two early fouls and Larry Drew is an ultraconservative coach, though.

Good win in the end. Hopefully our offense shows up at some point this series.

Is not impressed with Larry Drew’s shenanigans.

The energy was awesome…the crowd came through when they were needed..it was great to be a part of it. Like Evan said…this was a defensive win…everytime we collectively and relentlessly play our D….we have shut our opponents down. The shots will start falling…we can’t let up on defense. Proud of the team…and the fans! I still believe! Go Magic!

DOMINATE is just too weak of a word for what Dwight does on the court & I dont thik this team even need to take a 3pt shot to win a game right now all its doing is taking them out. too many threes!You gotta love the way Jameer played last night, he didn’t stuff the stat sheet but he was aggressive ALL night and had a huge impact on the game. I thin the only way to open up the three point line is to stop taking so many,all of our passing and shooting seems to take place at the three point line, so they crowd the passing lanes and defend the three point line at the same time, the only way were making plays is by penetration, they need to pass the ball more inside the 3pt line more,our 3pt game is too easy to defend to rely on it to win a championship. I would love to never ever see them take a 3pt shot with more than 10 seconds on the shot clock. POUND THE ROCK!

And there is only 50 posts. Yet when the Magic win there is 150 by the next day?? People panic too much. SVG made adjustments. Magic will shoot better. Should take this series.

I was more impressed with this game than game 1, and not because we won. He was EVERYWHERE. Jamal Crawford shooting a floater over the backboard because he saw Dwight coming? Thats just sick. Other notes from the game:
-JJ’s dive for the loose ball really changed the momentum. Great, great play by JJ.

-Still love Turk, but goodness gracious he could not buy a bucket. He only took maybe 2 or 3 bad shots, the rest seemed to be good looks.

-RIP, Hibachi.

-Bass was missing some easy shots, but he did a great job defending Horford.

-Anderson, JJ, and Q should be our only bench players now.

Can’t wait for the next game.

It looks like this Magic team will make me break remotes and overall cry like a baby. I take this game way too seriously, and I admit it. So in the midst of the Magic looking like they would rather be at home than playing, forgive me if I have a crazed outburst or two in the threads.

I wouldn’t want to play this Magic team. I mean, you can scheme for the worst-bad shooting and one-man offense-or scheme for the best-4/1 with great ball movement and dagger three-pointers-but you have no idea what you’re actually going to see.
I am beginning to suspect that not even Stan knows what he’s going to get night-in, night-out, and since he looks like the contents of his arteries are 60% barbecue sauce anyway, that can’t be healthy.
I think we’ll get past the hawks, but the good Magic better show up for round 2.

1. Howard is gonna have to get some rest during the games. he can’t always go 48 minutes. it gonna take a toll on him sooner or later. whether playing both bass and ryno. or having clark playing 4-6 minute to give howard a breather. that bringing up my other point.
2.The others are gonna have to step up there game. j-rich, hedo, bass, ryno,j.j (even though he’s coming off injury that’s no excuse)
3.the D. although it was good it could have been better. there were to many open shots for the hawks,but they were just not hitting them (same with us). which bring me to my next point.
4.We are going to have to start making our shots. so many open shots and they are just not making them. all of u say they are are gonna start making them in time. but if they don’t start doing it next game it’s gonna pose a big problem for us.