Hey, Remember Us? Magic Make Their Point

ORLANDO -- After the Orlando Magic's 104-95 win over the Miami Heat on Wednesday, Magic coach Stan Van Gundy peered out from the dais in the interview room at the gleaming new Amway Center. He shook his head, then marveled at the swell of media populating the room.

"You play the Heat and it's like double the crowd in here," Van Gundy said. "It's like they're the only team in the league."

Van Gundy's wry indignation was understandable. Despite the fact that his team strung together consecutive 59-win campaigns over the past two seasons, the Magic entered training camp as an afterthought in the minds of many. The Boston Celtics were the defending conference champions, and the Miami Heat were the anointed favorites.

Yet on Thanksgiving morning, the Magic (10-4) sit only one-half game behind the Celtics for the conference's best record, on pace for -- you guessed it -- another 59-win season.

Whether it's a lack of sex appeal, their relatively small market, or a glib skepticism that a team that relies on the three can't win a title, the Magic have remained under the radar, despite their lengthy résumé of achievement.

"We're one of the teams that's not talked about, and it's fine with us," Magic point guard Jameer Nelson said. "We understand in the East right now, everybody is talking about Miami -- whether it's good or bad -- and Boston.

"They get more attention than us, but there's nothing we can do about it."

A few seasons ago -- back when the Celtics has just assembled their big 3, the grizzled Pistons were still competent and the Cavaliers were riding LeBron James, -- the Magic assumed the role as the up-and-comers in the East. Dwight Howard was still a pup on the block. Van Gundy surrounded him with shooters, and a system was born.

Van Gundy might look like an unmade bed, but the schemes he has implemented in Orlando over the past few years are crisp and clean. Howard and Nelson have been the foundation of the Magic's system.

On Wednesday night, the Magic's lethal big-small combination executed the playbook with precision as Orlando racked up 104 points in a methodical game that featured only 90 possessions -- an outstanding rating of 115.6 against Miami's fourth-ranked defense.

The first principle of Orlando's offense is to attack. That's Nelson's function, whether it's a dribble-drive with a kickout to a shooter, or via a pick-and-roll. Nelson was brilliant against Miami, racking up a career-high 14 assists to go along with 17 points before his unceremonious ejection for mouthing off to Eddie House.

"Jameer did a great job of attacking and probing, trying to find spots in their defense to score or either pass out to threes or look inside," Howard said.

Nelson can be a frustratingly schizophrenic point guard. Sometimes he's a pass-first guard; at other times, he's a single-minded scorer -- and once in a while he chooses the first when the game demands the second, and vice versa. Nelson is not one of the league's dynamo passers and can occasionally be stunted by aggressive coverages on the pick-and-roll, something Miami did effectively in its 95-70 wallop of Orlando in the teams' first meeting.

"The first time we played them, Jameer kind of got stuck on the pick-and-rolls," Howard said. "He wasn't attacking like he needed to. I told him tonight to be aggressive. '[The Heat] are going to get out early and show with their bigs, but you should be able to get around them."

Howard's pep talk was prophetic. Time and again on Wednesday, Nelson would squirt to the left or right of a showing Miami big man, turn the corner and make a play or reach the cup. He found his big men, Howard and Brandon Bass, for eight of his assists, and connected on six dimes with his perimeter shooters.

"I just need to get into the paint and be aggressive," Nelson said. "When the ball gets into the paint, that's the heart of the defense."

The Magic ripped the Heat's heart out after Miami made its run midway through the fourth quarter, at one point taking a 88-87 lead. But then Nelson took over, cutting his way through the Heat's defense. During a three-minute stretch before getting tossed, Nelson scored eight points and assisted on a huge J.J. Redick jumper that gave the Magic a six-point lead with 3:12 remaining.

Redick seems to be emerging from the brutal slump he's endured over the first month of the season. He added 20 points on Wednesday and credited Van Gundy's system for continuing to feed him the good looks he and other slumping shooters, such as Rashard Lewis, needs to get their strokes going.

"They system is going to allow us to get shots," Redick said. "We have the big fellas inside and Jameer penetrating the way he's been penetrating the last few games, we're going to get looks."

The aforementioned big fella posted some impressive totals as well, finishing with 24 points and 18 points. In their first game against Miami, the Magic fed the ball into Howard down on the block, at which point the offense grinded to a halt.

"Tonight, interestingly, [Howard] scores more points and gets more rebounds and we didn't call straight post-up plays," Van Gundy said. "We didn't just let [our players] stand and stare at him."

As orthodox as Van Gundy's system is, it's this kind of flexibility that's enabled them to consistently rank among the league's most efficient offenses. If defenses refuse to be drawn in by Howard in the post, then put him in pick-and-rolls. If the opposition is running your shooters off the line, then put them in motion -- something the Magic did beautifully on Wednesday. And if your point guard is finding resistance up top, make the defense pay for their aggressive coverage. Once the Magic's shooters find their stroke, the offense will return to its rightful place in those ranks.

So far as the Heat go, Van Gundy simultaneously rejected any notion that his team's win over Miami was more meaningful -- but at the same time, couldn't resist taking another dig at the undue attention his former organization has received.

"You would think we were in the NBA Finals with all the people here," Van Gundy said. "Everybody in the media is so interested in the Heat, but I just think it's another team."

Kevin Arnovitz is a regular contributor to the Daily Dime.