The Orlando Magic’s fourth quarter problem
The Orlando Magic struggled late in games. It was well documents, although maybe not as bad. It is a symptom of the larger problem with the team’s 2015.
The Orlando Magic knew there would be growing pains. The 2015 Magic were not a team expected to be an offensive juggernaut or anything close to one. They were not expected to be able to generate offense easily.
So when games tighten up in the fourth quarter, the Magic were expected to have their struggles once again. Leads would disappear, deficits would grow larger and games would get lost on the crux of inexperience.
This season was about hopefully seeing progress in these late-game moments and growing up. So the Magic’s 25-win total, could easily have been closer to 30 if the Magic were better late in games.
The struggles at the end have been written about a ton and were an ongoing story throughout the entire season.
Yet, they are not going to go away any time soon. This weekend’s NBA Playoff games opened up the can of worms of what it means to be “clutch.” It is too juicy a subject not to discuss.
The Magic’s fourth-quarter problems — their net efficiency rating in fourth quarters was -2.4 points per 100 possessions. It was not by any means the worst in the league. So maybe the Magic’s fourth-quarter problems are not as pronounced as they seem. The missteps just stand out because there were some major missteps.
It seemed, at least early in the season, the Magic were thrilled to see themselves in more close-game situations. They saw themselves put in positions they had not been in before. Learning could come through experience.
“If you look back at all of our games where we have lost, they’ve come in the fourth quarter and they’ve come from us just not executing what we do.” –Tobias Harris
“If you look back at all of our games where we have lost, they’ve come in the fourth quarter and they’ve come from us just not executing what we do,” Tobias Harris said after losing to the Cavaliers in late December. “If you just watch the film on the game, you see two different teams from the first three quarters into the fourth quarter. Especially the last five minutes of the game. It’s disappointing, it’s frustrating, it’s just happening over and over again and we’ve got to stay disciplined. That’s the biggest thing. We’ve got to stay disciplined.”
That discipline was inconsistent throughout the season. It was a problem Magic players were very well aware of throughout the 2015 season.
And the Magic were about average in net efficiency rating in close games — defined as a game within five points with five minutes to play. In 50 such games (the most in the league), the Magic were -1.8 points per 100 possessions. That was good for 15th in the league.
Close games rely a lot on luck, so maybe with better fortune, the Magic would have scored a few more wins. According to NBA.com, the Magic went 21-29 in those close games. If they had gone .500 — 25-25 — that is only four more wins. So the Magic’s problems in collecting wins probably goes beyond winning close games. They fared fairly well and maybe played in too many close games to be successful.
And, of course, the more you zoom in the microscope, the worse the Magic seem to fair. They played 42 games (tied for most in the league) within five points with two minutes left and produced a -7.9 net efficiency rating and an 18-24 record. In 32 games where they were ahead or behind by three points with a minute left, the Magic were 13-19 with a -25.9 efficiency rating.
The Magic still had some learning to go at the dying breath of each game.
“We’re working through these fourth quarters,” James Borrego said. “We’re learning how to execute down the stretch. We’re learning how to play against a team that has picked up their intensity. And through that intensity, we have to execute more, we have to trust each other more than we saw in the fourth quarter [against the Hawks in late March]. We’re growing through that. We’re learning. We’re a work in progress.”
When Jacque Vaughn was in charge he was saying much the same things. He was hoping the team would learn to execute and play the last two minutes with the same focus and energy of the first 46 minutes. There was a bit of locking up late in the game.
It was a puzzle Vaughn could not solve and Borrego was not immune either. Players pointed at themselves for their troubles even as the same mistakes repeated themselves.
“It’s just going to take a consistent effort all night to just play basketball,” Tobias Harris said. “It’s going to take a toughness from us. Every guy in this locker room knows we can’t do it individually. We have to do it as a team on offense and on defense. That’s something we have to continue to work on.”
Winning and losing comes down to these moments. No matter how we cut the numbers, the Magic left games on the table — in very demonstrable and impossible ways. Those moments tend to stick out and overshadow the moments of brilliance.
And there were a lot of losses in the meantime.
Everything from the 2015 season though had the tinge of the team’s ongoing improvement. That was part of its purpose, wasn’t it?
To sit at the end of the season and find quotes from December to be just as applicable.
The Magic still have a lot of growing up to do. Especially in crunch time. That is a big thing holding them back. But not the biggest thing.
The problem remains the same.
“For this team to develop and move forward in the right direction, that’s kind of been our Achilles heel: the second half,” Ben Gordon said following the December loss to the Cavaliers. “We’ve just got to do a better job of managing the game and doing whatever is called for, whether it be on the defensive end or whether it be ball movement and getting an easy basket. Those are going to be the things that determine how well we do from here on out.”
Indeed, consistency and experience are probably the biggest things holding the Magic back. And that is what is needed most in these moments. As the team grows up, assumedly, the Magic will become better at the end of thsese games and close them out more successfully.