Saying and doing change are two different things for Orlando Magic

The Orlando Magic are saying many of the right things in trying to right the ship off this losing streak. Doing that change is the challenge.

The Orlando Magic understand there has ben slippage on both offense and defense since the team’s five-game win streak and surprise run up the Eastern Conference. They verbalize it after every uneven performance or loss.

It is not quite something they can explain. Translating the errors they are making into action has been the difficulty of this stretch.

“It’s one thing to say that, but then we have to do something about it,” coach Scott Skiles said. “We have to play like we understand that. We were able to beat Brooklyn not playing very well. We were able to win the game. Defense was better. But then we came back against Washington and didn’t play well at all. It’s good that the guys verbally acknowledge it, but now we have to acknowledge it with our play.”

It is true the Magic have been as uneven as ever.

According to Basketball-Reference, the Magic played nine consecutive games with an offensive rating of greater than 100 points per 100 possessions. They have played with an offensive rating greater than 100 in just two of the past six games.

The defensive slippage has been notable. The team has given up more than 100 points per 100 possessions in six of the past seven games.

To put that in more stark contrast, in the last six games, the Magic have the 27th best offensive rating (95.6 points per 100 possessions) and 22nd best defensive rating (108.4 points per 100 possessions), according to NBA.com. That would make them 27th in the league in net rating at -12.8 points per 100 possessions.

Putting it more bluntly, the Magic are playing like one of the worst teams in the league since the beginning of January, continuing a downfall that seemingly had its seeds laid earlier as the team came down off the high of a long winning streak.

“It has been both ends lately,” Skiles said. “Our defense hasn’t been very good. Our offense hasn’t been efficient. We need to get both ends back on track. We had a good workout today. Even in the losses, we’ve had pockets of the game where we have played well. We just haven’t been able to do it consistently enough lately.”

The five-game win streak moved the Magic to 11-8 and the team has played roughly .500 ball since then. That might be more of who this team is than anything else.

There are ups and downs and fits and starts to a team like this.

In that sense, perhaps the Magic heading to London and having an extended period off could be a time to get back into the gym and get some much-needed practice.

The day Monday was spent doing some scrimmaging and re-enforcing some defensive drills before the team boarded a plane for London. They will have two scheduled practice sessions there before Thursday’s game. Then there will be the opportunity for some practice time when they return before returning to the grind of the NBA season Monday in Atlanta.

Nikola Vucevic said the practice time would be an opportunity to get some things straightened out, fix mistakes in real time and get some more repetitions. There has been undeniable slipping as has been described plenty.

The good news is though, the Magic have shown they are capable of playing at a very high level.

“We’ve shown we can do it,” Vucevic said. “In a lot of games, we’ll do it for two or three quarters and not do it in the end and it will just slip away. We know that we can do it. We know we have the talent and capacity to do it. We just have to be consistent with it. I think doing it in practice very day, different drills and scrimmaging, it becomes more automatic.”

The problems with the Magic of late are not anything new to the players. It is not something hidden or unknown. They know these problems exist and need correcting.

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As Skiles said though, putting the fixes to action in games has been the tricky part for this young team. There is undoubtedly still learning and still some fine tuning to come with details and defensive principles.

The Magic, if they want to be more than a .500 team and want to get to the Playoffs, will have to find a way to put their fixes into action and produce results.

“It’s very hard to win a game in the NBA,” Scott Skiles said. “Some teams acknowledge how hard it is and actually get into how hard it is. They enjoy the feeling of it being hard and accomplishing something. For other people, it’s too hard for them. We’re trying to find out where we are on that scale.”