The Orlando Magic are struggling to get their offense going right now. The stifled offense struggled to keep pace with the Houston Rockets.
Coach Frank Vogel and star forward Aaron Gordon had almost the same reaction as they were asked to break down their latest loss, this time a 116-98 loss to the Houston Rockets.
There were defensive errors to be sure and plenty of offensive frustration. They let their poor shooting seemingly affect their intensity elsewhere. But they were trying to figure out exactly how they got to that point to begin with.
Throughout much of the first quarter, the ball worked its way around the perimeter and found the open man — whether it was Jonathon Simmons or Evan Fournier or whomever — and consistently the shots would fall in and out or just plain miss. The Magic never could find their rhythm.
And the Houston Rockets pounced, switching freely to disrupt whatever other rhythm the Orlando Magic could get. Orlando eventually just struggled to initiate their offense. The team was not able to generate good shots. The passing decreased and the offense bogged down.
Stuck at four points for nearly four minutes and without a field goal for nearly five minutes in the first quarter, the Magic fell behind a Rockets team that can score points at will. Just because they did not in this game does not mean much of anything. They did what they had to do to stymie the Magic.
"“Sometimes the shot is not going to fall,” Aaron Gordon said. “We got the looks that we wanted to get. But they didn’t fall. It happens. You keep shooting. As much as I was missing, I had no worries that the next one was going to go through.”"
That is the confidence a shooter has to have. Especially one as important to his team as Gordon is. He finished with 16 points, but hit on just 7 of his 23 shots.
The Rockets’ switching defensive scheme seemed to frustrate him and confuse the Magic’s offense. They never were able to slip the switches or attack off of them, falling into the trap and finding no space to attack or create mismatches.
Teams are starting to do this more and more with the Magic, hoping to neutralize Gordon’s sudden surge. It was not until the game was decided that the team started moving the ball into the paint and attacking these switches with confidence.
That was part of a larger problem with the team. Gordon admitted after the game he did not feel particularly good early in the game, promising to get himself into a better rhythm pregame and play with better energy moving forward.
Something was just off all night.
Orlando shot just 38.5 percent from the floor. Evan Fournier made just 2 of his 11 shots all game, perhaps a product of his return from injury with his second straight game struggling from the floor.
Orlando Magic
No matter how anyone slices it, the Magic were not making shots and they need to be better.
"“I thought through the game we tried to make the extra pass and throughout the game, we didn’t get the payoff,” Vogel said. “We didn’t shoot the ball well. And not making shots, everything in the game gets harder. You press a little bit more, you know your focus on the defensive end slips a little bit. And we got to overcome that.”"
That has been increasingly difficult to overcome, costing the team games throughout the season. And even now with the Magic returning to some semblance of health.
Orlando has struggled for some time offensively. Since Fournier’s return five games ago, the Magic are posting a 100.5 offensive rating, the third-worst mark in the league. The team has a 47.3 percent effective field goal percentage.
The Magic’s offensive problems from Wednesday night are not something new or foreign. It has been a continuing problem — dating back to when the team was facing heavy injuries to now even with many of their players back.
Orlando’s offense has found itself stuck in the mud.
Much of the problem in Monday’s loss to the Brooklyn Nets came from poor ball movement. That helped devolve the team into one-on-one play where they forced things and tried to create on their own. The rest of the offense became stagnant.
That proved to be the trap the Magic fell into Wednesday night against the Rockets.
"“We had a lot of good looks and we just missed them,” Jonathon Simmons said. “We just couldn’t make shots tonight.“[We need] smarter possessions. Just more screening for each other, more cutting and just playing with the pass a lot more.”"
Simply put, the Magic have to shoot the ball better.
There really is not much comment to make. Orlando has to work to get better shots and keep their ball and player movement up. Consistently that is the part that seems to be missing.
This team needs its shooting to pick up the rest of its play. Too often, the team notices, the defense slips when the offense is not rolling at a high level. The poor shooting seems to sap their energy. And it has been too difficult to reclaim.
"“That’s generally what happens,” Gordon said. “You try to avoid that. But you want to avoid that the best you can. But sometimes shots aren’t going to fall, you have to find other ways to win. We didn’t do that.”"
The NBA is a miss-or-make league as many coaches would say. The Magic right now are missing. And missing a lot.
Next: Grades: Houston Rockets 116, Orlando Magic 98
Something the team has to find a way to work through — whether it is getting the shots they do get to go down or executing better to get higher quality shots. The Magic are off right now.