The Orlando Magic are in a bit of a funk, losing three of their last four games. They will try to bounce back when they host the Portland Trail Blazers Saturday night.
The Magic have fallen to 19-7 while the Blazers enter the game at 16-11. Orlando is 9-2 at home and the Blazers are 6-7 on the road.
Tip off from Amway Arena is set for 7:00 pm EST. The game will air on Fox Sports Florida and will also be shown nationally by NBA TV. 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 -9
Starters:
Orlando
Dwight Howard
Rashard Lewis
Mickael Pietrus
Vince Carter
Jason Williams
Portland
Joel Przybilla
LaMarcus Aldridge
Martell Webster
Brandon Roy
Andre Miller
The Blazers are coming off an incredible win over the Phoenix Suns Thursday night.
The Magic are coming off a blowout loss to the Miami Heat in what was their worst performance of the season.
The Blazers had high hopes entering the season. Portland made the playoffs last year and added Point Guard Andre Miller. Former #1 pick Greg Oden played 61 games last season and the Blazers were counting on his development to help move them past the first round. Oden has showed some improvement. All of his averages are up (11.1 points per game, 8.5 rebounds per game, 2.29 blocks per game). Unfortunately, Oden’s string of bad luck continued. Oden had surgery on his left knee and it was reported that he would miss the remainder of the season. This week, Oden stated that he hopes to play again this season, but that seems unlikely.
Statistically, the Blazers are one of the better teams in the NBA. Portland scores 96.7 points per game and does it fairly efficiently, ranking 11th in the league in that category. The offense starts with superstar SG Brandon Roy. Roy is one of the game’s best all around players. He scores 21.6 points per game on 44.4% shooting. He also grabs 4.8 rebounds per game and dishes out 5.1 assists per game. Mickael Pietrus will likely have the duty of trying to slow Roy.
Last season, Roy and talented Power Forward LaMarcus Aldridge often ran the pick-and-roll and ran it very well. That could be bad news for the Magic who have really struggled against the pick-and-roll. Orlando’s big men have done a decent job defending it but their perimeter players have struggled, which is definitely an area of concern in tonight’s game.
In Portland’s victory over Phoenix, second year Point Guard Jerryd Bayless had his best game as a pro. He scored 29 points on 9-of-15 shooting. This could spell trouble for a team like Orlando that traditionally has trouble defending Point Guards because Portland goes three-deep at the position (Andre Miller, Steve Blake, Bayless).
Defensively, the Blazers are a very good team. They give up just 92.6 points per game and rank sixth in defensive efficiency. Oden’s rebounding and shot blocking obviously heavily contributed to these statistics, but the Blazers are still a pretty good defensive team without Oden.
As long as Howard stays out of foul trouble (and he has, lately), he should have his way on the glass, defensively, and offensively.
Portland has no answer for the big man Przybilla is no match for Howard.
In their preview, Blazers Edges suggests that Portland should make Howard beat them and make sure that Orlando’s shooters don’t beat them.
Orlando came out flat and played with no energy during Thursday night’s loss against the Heat. Rarely do you see that out of the Magic two games in a row. I expect the Magic to come out with a lot of energy and expect Dwight Howard to dominate tonight.
For more on the Blazers, check out two of the best individual team blogs out there, Blazers Edge and Rip City Project.
(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.)