Dwight Howard dunks down 2 of his game-high 28 points in the Magic's win over the Timberwolves, 111-103.
Photo by David Sherman, the Associated Press

It wasn't easy, but we did it. Here's the boxscore.

The Magic held a sixteen-point lead in the fourth quarter, then watched the Timberwolves score fourteen straight points to make it interesting. Rashard Lewis put the game away for Orlando, hitting three three-pointers in a two-minute span to put the Magic back in control. Carlos Arroyo shined in the starting point guard role, posting 18 points, 6 assists, and just 1 turnover.

Despite the fact that we nearly lost a game after blowing a big lead to an inferior opponent, there are plenty of positives to take from this game:

• Rashard Lewis, after going scoreless in the second half of Saturday's victory over Washington, went off for 16 second-half points tonight, including the aforementioned clutch three-pointers. The Magic gave the ball to him late and he delivered in a big way. Indeed, the Magic finally have a go-to guy.
• Did I mention that Rashard shot 7-of-9 from downtown? That makes him 14-of-23 on the season, or a sizzling 60.9%.
• Dwight Howard turned in his best game of the young season, going for 28 points and 16 rebounds. He also gave Al Jefferson fits, forcing Big Al to commit 5 fouls. He was also money at the foul line, going 12-of-16.
• We were second-to-last in the league in turnovers last season. Tonight? Just 9 turnovers. Dwight Howard, last season's turnover leader, did not cough up the ball at all tonight.

What I worry about most is the fact that the starters had to play big minutes. We have to play again tomorrow night in Toronto, so I hope our guys aren't too gassed from tonight. We face a Raptor team tomorrow night that went 4-0 against us last season. Luckily for us, the Raptors also played tonight, and got hammered by 27 points in Milwaukee, so they will also face fatigue issues.

There's also the matter of Keith Bogans' plummet back down to Earth. KeBo was a miserable 2-of-7 tonight, but he atoned for it with 9 rebounds. However, if he keeps shooting at this awful rate, teams will feel free to double Dwight Howard off him and dare him to take the three-point shot. Since J.J. Redick is out indefinitely with back spasms, and Keyon Dooling figures to play most of his minutes as the backup point guard, we'll have a void to fill at the two-guard position.

A win is a win, but tonight's game raises questions about our mental toughness and about our depth in the backcourt. If we're able to beat the Raptors tomorrow, I'll be very impressed.

Brian Schmitz has the unfortunate news that Jameer Nelson took an elbow to the head in practice and is suffering from concussion-like symptoms. He is inactive tonight.

Time for Carlos Arroyo and Keyon Dooling to step up.

And you thought yesterday's update was scant...

• Brian Schmitz reports that, as expected, Adonal Foyle will play plenty of minutes tonight to help the Magic match up with the Timberwolves' big, physical frontcourt. He won't start, though.
• The Sentinel's Etan Horowitz has written this must-read FAQ about the Magic's complicated TV situation involving Bright House Networks, FSN Florida, and Sun Sports.
• Brendan Sonnone of Believing in Magic will be live-blogging tonight's game.

	vs.
0-2		2-1
Target Center
8:00 PM
Probable starters:
Sebastian Telfair	PG	Jameer Nelson
Rashad McCants	SG	Keith Bogans
Ryan Gomes	SF	Hedo Turkoglu
Al Jefferson	PF	Rashard Lewis
Theo Ratliff	C	Dwight Howard

25 words or fewer:The Magic travel to Minnesota to face a Timberwolves team that has yet to win a game this season.

Know your enemy: The 'Wolves remained competitive with the Knicks on Sunday, but wound up losing 97-93. Newly-acquired Antoine Walker missed what would have been the game-tying three-pointer for Minnesota. Zach Randolph hit a free throw to secure the final margin.

Useless information: Only five players from last year's Wolves team -- Randy Foye, Marko Jaric, Rashad McCants, Mark Madsen, and Craig Smith -- remain on this year's squad.

Bullet points:

• Tonight's game is on Sun Sports, so Bright House customers in Orlando should be able to see it.
• Here's an old Bill Simmons column in which the Sports Guy argues that Al Jefferson is better than Dwight Howard. Question: had Jefferson played for Minnesota last season, instead of for Simmons' native Boston, would Simmons have taken up this fight?
• Rumor has it that Michael Doleac, whom the Timberwolves recently acquired from Miami in the Ricky Davis trade, may end up playing for the Magic this season.
• I'd like to forget this overtime loss to the Timberwolves from last season, but I just cant. Trailing by one point in the last few seconds of overtime, Jameer Nelson drives into the lane, floats up a shot... and has it swatted by Kevin Garnett. Hey, I like Jameer, but shouldn't he have known that Ticket was gonna be there to reject that shot? Ugly.
• In two games against Minnesota last season, Rashard Lewis averaged 28.5 points on 37.5% shooting. He's been a dead-eye shooter so far this season -- 56% shooting from a wing player?! -- so let's hope he doesn't revert back to his less-than-accurate ways.
• I really dig this Timberwolves blog. How the heck did they get the 'Wolves' jersey font onto their computer? As the late Mitch Hedberg might have said, "That's f---in' magical." No pun intended

Pre-game, in-game, and post-game comments go here. As usual, I'll have a wrap-up posted shortly after the conclusion of the game.

Brian Schmitz of the Orlando Sentinel filed this report on his blog earlier today, and it's not good news. Emphases mine:

Shooting guard J.J. Redick sustained a back injury --- believed to be back spasms --- while coming down after a lay-up attempt. He walked out gingerly, needing to pause as he was escorted to the team bus by trainer Tom Smith.

He's likely out for the game against the T-Wolves.

Power forward Pat Garrity sprained his right ankle during the practice and said he was in more pain than usual. "I've done it before, but this hurts," said Garrity, who likely will be a game-time decision.

The Magic are already short big men, and if Garrity can't play, second-year forward James Augustine or veteran Bo Outlaw could be called upon.

I hope that J.J. and Pat recover quickly from their injuries. J.J. hadn't been playing a lot, but we'll need his shooting when (not if) Keith Bogans goes cold. Although Pat isn't a great player, he's a guy who can play the four, and we need all of those we can get since Tony Battie is out for the season.

This thought just occurred to me: if Pat Garrity is unavailable, might Trevor Ariza see some playing time at power forward?

Additionally, Schmitz writes that Stan Van Gundy told reporters that he's made changes to the Magic's rotation, but he did not specify what those changes were. He did say, however, the Magic will use the same starting lineup of Jameer Nelson, Keith Bogans, Hedo Turkoglu, Rashard Lewis, and Dwight Howard. Rumor had it that Adonal Foyle would start against Minnesota because of the Timberwolves' large frontcourt.