The Orlando Magic battled back from a 19-point second quarter deficit, but came up short, losing to the Phoenix Suns, 106-103. Give the Magic credit, they fell behind big early before coming back, but they couldn’t quite seal the deal. It was like the Magic traded scripts with the Suns before the game began. The Magic have lost early leads in each of their three previous games during their road trip. Amar’e Stoudemire finished with 28 points and 10 rebounds, including a decisive offensive rebound and dunk that gave Phoenix a 3-point lead with just 6.9 seconds to play. Steve Nash had 20 points, 18 assists and 7 rebounds. Rashard Lewis had 24 points to lead the Magic. Mickael Pietrus had 23 points while Dwight Howard finished with 10 points and 18 rebounds.
After the Magic took an early 9-7 lead, it was all Suns in the first quarter. Phoenix went on a 17-0 run. During the Suns’ run, the Magic had a stretch of six straight possessions with a turnover. Sloppy play put the Magic in quite the hole. After going down 24-9, the Magic found some of their wings cutting to the basket and got back into the game, cutting the lead to 11 at the end of the period. Phoenix was 13-of-23 from the field in the quarter while Orlando was 8-of-20. The Magic finished the quarter with 8 turnovers.
The Suns scored the first 8 points of the second period and built a 19-point lead at 41-22. Orlando answered that with 8-0 run of their own. Ryan Anderson hit 2 3-pointers and forced a steal during the run. Rashard Lewis’ second 3-pointer of the quarter cut the Suns’ lead to just 3. The Magic had some defensive lapses at the end of the period that allowed the Suns to get the lead back to 12 on a 3-pointer by Jared Dudley with just 3 seconds left. Jason Williams threw a beautiful pass to Matt Barnes, who beat the buzzer with a 3-pointer.
Mickael Pietrus went crazy in the third quarter. He made four 3-pointers and scored 15 points in the period. The Magic cut the lead to 4 by the end of the period and could have been in even better shape if Dwight Howard did not miss six straight free throws at one point during the period. During the quarter, Vince Carter injured his knee and did not return.
The Magic came out confident in the final period and it took them just 3:34 to take the lead. Anthony Johnson was Orlando’s star of the quarter. He hit two free throws and then made a layup to give Orlando their first lead since 9-7 at 90-89 with 8:26 to play. He also hit a 3-pointer to extend Orlando’s lead to 95-91. Johnson later hit a jumper to put Orlando up before Jason Richardson nailed a 3-pointer to give the Suns a 2-point lead. A.J. answered with another layup to tie it at 101. Mickael Pietrus’ free throws with 1:23 to go gave Orlando a 103-102 lead, but they would not score again. A.J. missed a 3-pointer after Grant Hill gave the Suns the lead. The Magic forced a turnover, but A.J. lost the ball off of Mickael Pietrus’ foot. On the next possession, Jared Dudley missed a 3-pointer, but Amar’e Stoudemire grabbed the rebound and got a dunk. Rashard Lewis came free in the corner on the next in-bounds play, but Matt Barnes couldn’t get him the ball. They tried the play again, but Lewis was trapped and air-balled a 3. Pietrus and Stoudemire both grabbed the ball and a jump ball was called. Stoudemire knocked the tip out of bounds. After a long review, Crawford called for another jump ball and somehow said that only .2 seconds ran off on the previous play. Orlando could not get a shot off.
Mickael Pietrus was excellent, especially in the third quarter, where he scored 15 of his 23 points. Pietrus was 8-of-15 and was 4-of-8 from downtown. He led the Magic’s third quarter rally and hit a lot of big shots. He also grabbed 8 rebounds.
Rashard Lewis led the Magic in scoring, but was 3-of-11 from beyond the arc and 6-of-16 from the field. He managed to get himself to the line nine times and hit each one of those free throws. He also had 6 rebounds.
Dwight Howard attempted just one shot, a dunk, in the entire game, and although that is not nearly enough, Howard had his chances. Howard played a game-high 41 minutes and did not pick up a foul. Howard did a good job of passing the ball, but he really struggled when he attempted to put the ball on the floor. He finished the game with five turnovers and his four first quarter turnovers were a big reason that the Magic fell so far behind. After a good start from the free throw line, Howard finished just 8-of-17 from the line and at one point, he missed six straight. He did do his job on the boards, grabbing 18 rebounds.
Before his injury, Vince Carter wasn’t shooting well (3-of-10), but I liked what he was doing. He was driving to the basket and managed to score 8 points, but more importantly, he set up his teammates well, dishing out 6 assists.
Anthony Johnson had a huge fourth quarter, scoring 11 of his points in the period. Steve Nash could not handle Johnson and Johnson took advantage. He made several big shots and on two separate occasions, gave the Magic the lead.
Johnson wasn’t the only bench player to play a big role for the Magic. Their bench was very productive for the second night in a row. They combined to score 38 points and grab 14 rebounds. Matt Barnes had 3 turnovers, but shot 3-of-6 from the field, scored 8 points and grabbed 4 rebounds. J.J. Redick hit two big 3-pointers and scored 9 points. Ryan Anderson finished with 6 points. Marcin Gortat scored 4 points and grabbed 3 rebounds. 2 of those rebounds were offensive. Gortat was very active while he was in, but as usual, he struggled against the pick-and-roll. Gortat did have one very nice series where he challenged a Stoudemire shot at one end and got a rebound and a bucket on the other. Brandon Bass received a DNP. The bench provided great energy for the Magic on Friday night and really ignited their comeback attempt.
Orlando’s defense was atrocious early on. The Suns were 26-of-46 from the field, had an effective field goal percentage of 62% and scored 61 points in the first half. In the second half, they really tightened up. Phoenix made just 15 field goals and had an eFG% of 43.8%.
Turnovers plagued the Magic. Orlando’s turnover percentage was 21.4% and their assist to turnover ratio was just .9. In the first half alone, Orlando turned the ball over 13 times and Phoenix scored 16 points off of those turnovers. The Suns finished the game with 23 points off of 21 Magic turnovers. Several of Orlando’s turnovers were unforced and none hurt more than Anthony Johnson’s lost ball off of Mickael Pietrus’ foot with just 34.9 seconds left trailing by only a point.
The Magic did a much better job on the glass. They grabbed 51 rebounds to Phoenix’s 42. The Magic also outrebounded the Magic on the offensive boards, grabbing 15 to the Suns’ 12. Orlando grabbed 54.1% of the rebounds and had an offensive rebound percentage of 33.3%, which is significantly higher than Orlando’s season average of 24.5. Phoenix’s rebounding numbers were all down from their season averages.
The Magic got to the free throw line more than the Suns and although they shot just 68.4% (26-of-38), they still shot better than Phoenix’s 58.3% (14-of-24). Orlando’s free throw rate was 50, up from their season average of 36.2.
Game Notes:
- The Magic lost 2 games in a row for the first time this season.
- Orlando was awful on 2-point field, shooting just 36.8%. Fortunately, they hit 13 3-pointers (on 38 attempts) and finished with an eFG% of 50.6%. Phoenix’s eFG% was 53.4%.
- Jared Dudley, who scored 17 points in Phoenix’s first meeting with Orlando, had a season-high 19 points tonight.
Next Up: The Magic return home to host the Indiana Pacers on Monday.
Final Thought: The Magic showed a lot of heart battling back from 19 points down.
(Andrew Melnick is Howard the Dunk’s lead blogger and a contributor at NFL Mocks Subscribe to his RSS feed and add him on Twitter to follow him daily.)