The Orlando Magic put an end into their two game losing streak by defeating the Indiana Pacers on Monday night and will look to start a winning streak when they take on the Toronto Raptors on Wednesday night.
The Magic enter the game at 18-6 while the Raptors fell to 11-16 after losing to the Miami Heat on Tuesday night. It was Toronto’s third loss in their last four games. Toronto is 4-11 on the road and the Magic are 8-2 at home.
The big story will be the return of Hedo Turkoglu to Amway Arena for the first time since Game 5 of the 2009 NBA Finals. Turkoglu is averaging 14.0 points per game on 44.2% shooting. He’s also averaging 4.9 rebounds per game and 4.0 assists per game.
Tip off from Amway is at 7:00 pm EST. You can catch the game on television on Sun Sports. As always, if you can’t watch the game, you can hear it locally on WDBO 580 AM and in Spanish on WONQ AM 1030.
The Line: Orlando – 11
Starters:
Toronto
Andrea Bargnani
Chris Bosh
Hedo Turkoglu
DeMar Derozan
Jarrett Jack
Orlando
Dwight Howard
Rashard Lewis
Mickael Pietrus
Vince Carter
Jameer Nelson
Last Meeting: The Magic got off to a terrible start in their last meeting on November 22, falling behind by as many as 11 points. Later in the game, Orlando crashed the boards much better and turned up their intensity on defense allowing them to come back and defeat the Raptors 104-96. Vince Carter, who was booed every time he touched the ball, finished with 24 points. Dwight Howard had 17 points and 12 rebounds. Chris Bosh led the Raptors with 22 points and 5 rebounds. You can read more about this game here.
Season Series: Orlando leads the season series 2-0, winning both games on Toronto’s home court. In their first meeting, Jameer Nelson had 30 points and J.J. Redick scored a career-high 27 points to lead the Magic to a 125-116 win. Orlando had 4 players score 20 or more points while Toronto was led Chris Bosh’s 35 points and 16 rebounds. You can read more about this game here.
About the Magic: After losing two games in a row, the Magic staged a late rally to defeat the Indiana Pacers and improved to 18-6 on Monday night.
Dwight Howard looked like his usually, dominating self, posting a monster state line of 21 points, 23 rebounds, and 4 blocks. Howard also stayed out of foul trouble, committing just 2 fouls. Howard’s performance was overshadowed by his near-skirmish with Pacers Forward Troy Murphy, but Howard had one of his best defensive games of the season and that should not be overlooked. Howard was dominating on Monday Not only did he block 4 shots, but he altered several others and pretty much shut down the paint in the second half.
It looks like the Magic will able to count on Vince Carter Wednesday night. Between his battle with illness and his trouble a sore knee that kept him out of the fourth quarter in Friday night’s loss to Phoenix, it looked Vince
Carter would not play on Monday. What happened? Carter did play and scored a game-high 28 points on 10-of-21 shooting.
Anthony Johnson has done an excellent job as the #2 Point Guard since Jameer Nelson suffered a torn meniscus and has played even better as of late. In fact, Johnson has received the clutch minutes over the past two games and has taken advantage. He scored 11 fourth quarter points in Phoenix against the Suns on Friday night and scored 13 points and dished out 8 assists against the Pacers Monday night. You can read more about Johnson and see what he had to say after Monday night’s game here.
About the Raptors: The Raptors had playoff aspirations at the start of the season, but their hopes are fading. They have lost three of their last four games and stand at 11-16.
Chris Bosh has been Toronto’s constant. He is averaging 24.0 points per game on 49.2% shooting from the field. He’s also grabbing 11.9 rebounds per game and blocking 1.08 shots per game. Bosh has been the fourth most efficient player in the entire league this season, posting a PER of 26.79. Only LeBron James, Chris Paul, and Tim Duncan have put up better numbers (in that order).
Bosh has been especially good against the Magic. In 19 games against the Magic, Bosh has averaged 23.7 points per game and 10.1 rebounds per game, while shooting over 50% from the field. Chris Bosh has had possibly the three best games of his career against the Magic, posting a 41-point, 8-rebound game in 2007, a 40-point game in 2008 and a 40-point, 18-rebound performance last season.
One player the Magic won’t have to worry about is starting Point Guard Jose Calderon. Calderon has missed the last two games four of his last five with a hip injury. In the lone game he played, Friday night against Atlanta, he could only go seven minutes. Jarrett Jack will start in his place.
The Raptors are one of the best offensive teams in the NBA. They score 103.7 points per game, shoot 46.4% from the field, hit 7.0 3-pointers per game and rank fourth in offensive efficiency.
The Magic will counter with the ninth most efficient defense in the league, but it is a defense that has some holes, especially as of late. Orlando’s defense has fallen from sixth since the beginning of their west coast road trip.
Outside of Anthony Johnson, J.J. Redick and Dwight Howard, Orlando played very poorly on the defensive end until the final period on Monday.
The Raptors are on pace to have a historically bad season on defense. They are giving up 108.3 points per game, allowing teams to shoot 47% from the field and are giving up 7.7 3-pointers per game. They are the least efficient team in the league on defense and there is a significant gap between Toronto and the league’s second least efficient team, Memphis.
That bodes very well for the Magic, who score 102.4 points per game and are the league’s fifth most efficient offensive team. Orlando’s shooters must be chomping at the bit because the Raptors are terrible at defending the 3-point line (and everything else too).
Toronto is also a slightly below average rebounding team and lack a true Center, So Howard and the Magic should have the advantage there.
The Raptors have given Orlando two tough games already this season, but the Magic held on to win both games and both games were played in Toronto.
If Orlando plays defense like they did in the fourth quarter of Monday night’s victory over the Pacers, they should get an easy win. If not, the Raptors should be able to stay in the game and will have a chance to pull off an upset.
(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.)