The NBA Playoffs: Where dominance happens.
Can you recall a basketball postseason that was so, um, lopsided? The Magic swept the Bobcats and Hawks. The Suns steamrolled the Spurs. The Lakers took care of the Jazz in four straight. Now Orlando is getting a taste of its own medicine in the Eastern Conference finals after Saturday’s lopsided loss in Boston.
The NBA is all about matchups, to the point that it should be written in the league rulebook. Momentum doesn’t mean squat if the team across the floor is constructed to beat you. And that’s a lesson Stan Van Gundy‘s Magic are learning the hard way against the Celtics.
This series is over, and it isn’t just because of Boston’s ridiculous track record when it has the hammer. It’s because the Celtics — with their great defense, clutch perimeter shooting and superior point guard play — are built to win in the playoffs. They also seem to want it more. On one particular play in the second quarter, Rajon Rondo beat Jason Williams down the court for a loose ball, dove on the floor to retrieve it and then got up and beat Williams again for a layup. It was just two points in a game the Celtics eventually would win by 23, but it was a clear indication of one team going for the kill and the other about to fold up shop.
The Magic fooled many with their eight-game blitz through Charlotte and Atlanta. Those teams couldn’t defend Orlando’s perimeter shooters and couldn’t body-up on Dwight Howard. So the Magic looked like world-beaters for eight games, moving the ball crisply, scoring efficiently and playing with the confidence of a team on the cusp of its second straight NBA Finals appearance.
But then Orlando ran into Boston — not Cleveland, the team the Magic were built to beat — and suddenly the whole thing came apart. Van Gundy’s boys are averaging 17 fewer points a game in the conference finals than they did in the first two rounds, Howard has been contained and Rondo is outplaying Jameer Nelson. Without Hedo Turkoglu on the roster, Orlando is missing its greatest weapon from last year’s playoff run, and that’s why the Magic are turning into a disappearing act.
