The Magic held a 60-48 lead over the Pistons with 9:23 to play in the third quarter of Game Four, and gained possession after referee Joe Crawford whistled Detroit's Antonio McDyess for offensive basket interference. At the 9:11 mark, Maurice Evans hit a three-pointer to give the Magic a 15-point advantage. As the media have well documented, the Pistons went on a 15-0 run to tie the game, and eventually won it with Tayshaun Prince's running hook with 00:08.9 to play in the fourth quarter. But whom should the Magic blame for their miscues? This table sums it up, from the 8:55 mark of the third (when Rodney Stuckey missed a three-pointer for Detroit) to the 2:56 mark of the third (when Richard Hamilton tied the game at 63 with a fast-break dunk):

Likewise, whom should the Pistons praise for their resurgence? Again, we have a table:

Yahoo!'s Kelly Dwyer and 3QC reader Eyriq both pointed out the appropriateness of this website's name after the Magic lost thanks to a blown third-quarter lead. I've already explained that I started the original site at Blogspot after a similar loss to the Sacramento Kings during the 2006/2007 season. But that's not when I came up with the site's name. In fact, I didn't come up with it at all.

My mom did.

Flashback to 2006. Somehow or another, my dad won free tickets to a Magic game. We went to claim them, hoping to choose the Lakers' visit to Orlando as our prize. As it turns out, we didn't have the ability to choose which game we'd attend, and the Magic representative gave us two tickets to see the Milwaukee Bucks on January 31st. The Magic won big, 98-73, and held a 56-29 lead at halftime, but almost gave the game back in the third quarter after being outscored, 24-13. "Just another third-quarter collapse by the Magic," Mom said later, describing the game. The phrase stuck with me, and I kept it in mind when I started the old site.

And that was that.

Some notes and references after the jump.

Continue reading this post »

Jameer Nelson has not won the respect of Pistons fans.

Some Detroit Bad Boys readers noted in the comments section of last night's game thread that they think Jameer Nelson intentionally took down Chauncey Billups last night. As best I can tell, "Other Matt" was the first person to posit the theory (warning: language). Here's the video, courtesy TrueHoop:

Take a look at the second replay, from about 00:14 to 00:17. Jameer has right foot wrapped around Billups' left foot when Billups' left leg comes out from under him, causing him to split. From my perspective, it seems unlikely that Jameer's foot got in that position accidentally. Henry Abbott agrees, but says, "This is no great scandal. It's hardly the most evil basketball play ever. It's just a little garden variety playoff feistiness." Matt Watson, who runs Detroit Bad Boys, disagrees, saying he "still lean[s] toward it being incidental."

Intentional or not, there's no question that Billups' health -- even if he's able to play as soon as Saturday, there's no way he'll be at 100% -- is a key factor in this series. Mike Bianchi of the Orlando Sentinel has gone so far as to guarantee the Magic will win the series as long as Billups doesn't come back "close to full strength."

Me? I'm not ready to say that just yet. The Pistons still lead the series, 2-1, and they have the depth and talent to compensate for Billups' 17 points per game.

[Note by Ben Q Rock, 05/08/08 7:37 PM EDT ]:

DBB commenter Rob G has an amusing, if not disconcerting, take on the situation:

On purpose or not - why can’t we knock the hell out of him the next time he drives the lane anyway?

Jameer better be careful. He's already had 2 concussions this year, and the last thing we need is our 26-year-old Point Guard of the Future sidelined with a serious injury while our backups try to pick up the slack.

• Dwight Howard joined Kevin Garnett, LeBron James, Kobe Bryant, and Chris Paul on the All-NBA First Team. Dwight was a Third-Teamer last year, so it's nice to see him make the leap. It's also nice to see that he finished ahead of Amare Stoudemire of Phoenix, who went nova after the Suns acquired Shaquille O'Neal. But Dwight dominated at center all year, and Amare dominated at power forward for half the year. Advantage: Dwight.
• Tim Povtak reports on Chauncey Billups' hamstring injury in the Orlando Sentinel. It sounds like it hasn't gotten better or worse, so there's still no indication if he'll play Saturday or not:

  "I'm sore. It's still sore," Billups said from the sideline Thursday. He walked slowly into Amway Arena with no energy in his step, but showing no signs of a limp. "I don't know (if he could play Saturday). I can't honest say either way at this point."

• John Denton has this perspective from the Pistons' trainer, Arnie Kander:

  "Most hamstring injuries that you are really fearful of are speed-related. They happen off fast movement. This was the slowest hamstring (injury) you're going to see," Kander said. "This was like a dancer who tries to do the splits and isn't ready for it. They get sore but they don't usually have any lasting effects. He's going to go through about 90 different treatments in the next couple of days and my goal is to get him ready for Saturday."

• Austin Kent of Hoops Addict says the Magic will only go as far as Dwight Howard takes them. He admits that this conclusion "isn't advanced neuroscience by any means," but the article is thoughtful and worth a look. (HT: EtB)
• Vegan Fish Tacos (yeah, I don't know either) has its latest mock NBA draft up. It has the Magic taking Jason Thompson, a center from Rider, with the 22nd pick. "If the Magic take a player who is not a big, their GM needs to be disembowled." (Another HT to EtB)
• Elie Seckbach, the embedded NBA correspondent, has a video interview with former Magic forward Trevor Ariza up at FanHouse. It's a nice interview, and features a cameo from Trevor's favorite Magic teammate (and one of my favorite players). Check it out, yo.
• Did I really just say that? I am so sorry.

Don't forget to weigh-in on the Fran Vazquez situation or on last night's big win over the Pistons. And wish Keyon Dooling a happy birthday, while you're at it. Have a good one, folks.

The NBA said its referees acted appropriately in awarding Chauncey Billups a three-point basket that should not have counted. Wait, what? Via Brian Schmitz, here's Joel Litvin, the NBA's President of Basketball Operations, commenting on the play. Emphases mine:

"After reviewing the video of last night's Pistons-Magic game, we determined that the play that concluded with Chauncey Billups' three-point field goal at the end of the third quarter took approximately 5.7 seconds. Because there were only 5.1 seconds remaining in the quarter when the play began, the shot would not have counted had the clock continued to run.

"The referees followed proper procedure in addressing the clock malfunction by estimating the elapsed time and using their judgment as to whether the shot was taken in time. Under NBA rules, the referees did not have the option of using instant replay and a timing device to determine exactly how much time had elapsed, nor do the rules allow for a re-play after a clock malfunction is discovered. The NBA Competition Committee was scheduled to discuss the possible expanded use of instant replay at its meeting at the end of the month and we will raise, for the Committee's consideration, the use of replay in situations like this."

The apology doesn't help us any, but if nothing else it highlights the absurdity of the replay rules as they currently stand.

Bring on the Pistons.

Detroit thumped Philadelphia, 100-77, tonight to advance to the Eastern Conference semifinals, where it will face Orlando.

No word yet on a complete schedule, but the Magic's official website says the Pistons will host Game One at 7:30 PM, this Saturday, on TNT.

Some playoff-centric stories for today...

• Brian Schmitz writes that tonight's Game Five between the Magic and the Raptors is Orlando's biggest in the Dwight Howard era:

  All season the mantra for the Magic --- heck, all offseason, since they were swept by the Pistons --- has been this:

  Win a series for the first time in 12 years, and it has been a great season. Everything after that is gravy.

  But lose, yikes, and 52-30 has all but been a waste of time. A good run spoiled.

  [....]

  The Howard Era Magic have taken step No. 1: Winning a playoff game.

  They have taken step No. 2: Winning a road playoff game.

  Now this is step No. 3: Closing out a series.

• Stan Van Gundy, who I imagine will receive some third-place Coach of the Year votes, used Pat Garrity extensively in practice yesterday, even though he's not likely to play in this series. Garrity, as the longest-tenured Magic player, participated in practice and spoke to his teammates about what it's like to lose a 3-1 lead in a playoff series.
• Meanwhile, David Whitley worries that Orlando residents will blame the Orlando Sentinel for jinxing the Magic if they lose tonight's game, and if they go on to lose the series.

  Regardless, I don't want Sentinel fingerprints near the Magic's windpipe. So we completely endorse the following comments:

  "It's not over yet," Dwight Howard said.

  "We're taking it one game at a time," Jameer Nelson said.

  "I'm looking forward to the second round," Tracy McGrady said.

  Arrrghhh. Please forget that last one.

  I'd say he did a fine job covering the Sentinel's assets on that one. I question the choice of decorating the front page of this morning's Sports section with a toe-tagged version of the Raptors' alternate logo. Yikes.

• Steve Buffery of the Toronto Sun (via TrueHoop) says Raptors coach Sam Mitchell needs to put Jason Kapono in the starting lineup tonight. After all, what does Mitchell have to lose? His job? Here's an interesting statistic from Buffery's article: Dwight Howard and Chris Bosh are essentially canceling each other out in this series. But the Magic's remaining four starters are scoring 16.7 points per game each, compared to 8.7 points per game for the Raptors. And Mitchell won Coach of the Year last year? Uh, okay...

One final, non-playoff link:

• Last week, We Rite Good hosted the final round of 2007/2008's blogger MVP/RoY rankings. They expanded the rankings to include Coach of the Year, Most Improved Player of the Year, and Seventh Man of the Year. So, here's Part I and here's Part II.

Hedo Turkoglu's most recent game-winning play for the Magic this season, a tough driving layup to beat the Raptors in Game Two.

Hedo Turkoglu is the NBA's Most Improved Player.

Brian Schmitz of the Orlando Sentinel reported the news earlier today. The Magic have called a news conference for tomorrow afternoon but haven't specified a reason. The award is indeed Hedo's, and deservedly so (no disrespect intended to Rudy Gay, Rajon Rondo, or Andrew Bynum).

We outlined how awesome Turk is in this post last week, but let's go over some stats: Turk set career highs in points per game (19.5), rebounds per game (5.7), assists per game (5.0), minutes per game (36.9), field goal percentage (.456), and games played (82, and he started all of them). Regarding advanced metrics, Turk had a career-best in Player Efficiency Rating (17.8) and effective field goal percentage (.524). Additionally, he was one of four players to average 19 points, 5 rebounds, and 5 assists this season, joining Kobe Bryant, LeBron James, and Vince Carter. Yeah, and we laughed at him when he told the Sentinel in November he thought he could be an All-Star.

We'd like to congratulate Hedo for winning this coveted award, and thank him for playing so well for us this season. Hopefully, he'll celebrate the achievement by helping us dispatch the Raptors. It'd be a fitting way for us to advance in the playoffs.

Can you believe it? Not that we made the playoffs; that much was never really in doubt at all this season. But we're just 2 days away from the start of the real season. The second season. So, with that in mind, here are some PLAYOFF LINKS! YEAH!

(I'm kinda pumped)

Okay. Here we go.

• Ball Don't Lie, the Yahoo! Sports NBA blog, asked me for some insight regarding the upcoming Magic/Raptors playoff series. Check it out here. I picked the Magic to win in 6, while Jeff Wong of The Score picked the Magic to win in 7 due to a questionable whistle, saying "That's the only way they can beat the Raptors, right?"
  • And, in case you missed it earlier this week, here's my contribution to Hardwood Paroxysm's Magic playoff preview.
• I also contributed to CelticsBlog's NBA Previews Review, in which bloggers who participated in CelticBlog's season previews reflect on their predictions. Not to pat myself on the back too much, but I hit it right on the head when I wrote that the Magic's strengths would be three-point shooting and rebounding, and that their weaknesses would be leadership and depth.
• Here's ESPN's Magic/Raptors playoff page. 9 of 10 ESPN experts picked the Magic to win, with Marc Stein the lone dissenter.
• Mike From Illinois looks at the Magic's won-lost splits as compared to last season. My favorite part? We were 25-16 at home this year and last year, which means our 12-game improvement came by winning 12 more games on the road than we did last season. Whuh...?!
• If you want to know which TNT broadcasting teams will call which playoff games, Awful Announcing has the list. The Magic/Raptors series has drawn play-by-play man Matt Devlin, color-commentator Mike Dunleavy Senior, and sideline reporter Stephanie Ready. (Thanks, HP.)

Plenty more playoff coverage to come, especially tomorrow, when we migrate to the new SBN platform. You can find our previous playoff coverage in this news post from earlier in the week.

In case you're curious, here's the schedule for the upcoming Magic/Raptors playoff series:

• Game 1: Sunday, April 20th, at Orlando, 12:30 PM, TNT
• Game 2: Tuesday, April 22nd, at Orlando, 7:30 PM, NBA TV
• Game 3: Thursday, April 24th, at Toronto, 7:30 PM, NBA TV
• Game 4: Saturday, April 26th, at Toronto, 3:00 PM, TNT

The next three games are marked "if necessary." They'll be necessary. No way this series ends in a sweep.

• Game 5: Monday, April 28th, at Orlando, 7:30 PM, NBA TV
• Game 6: Thursday, May 1st, at Toronto, time TBD, TV station TBD
• Game 7: Saturday, May 3rd: at Orlando, time TBD, TNT

Yeah, I know, it sucks that games 2 and 3 are on NBA TV, which not everyone has. After a season of Magic fans having to put up with FSN's crap, the last thing we should have to deal with is not being able to see our team IN THE PLAYOFFS. But as Brian Schmitz notes, Sun Sports may choose to televise those games locally.

Check out the full 2007/2008 NBA playoff schedule at NBA.com.

COOKIE MONSTER is ready for the Magic's playoff series with the Raptors to begin. Are you?
NYCMagicFan

Today's news post features playoff prediction posts and reactions to the forthcoming Magic/Raptors postseason matchup...

• If you want to show you believe in Magic, you might consider using one of these signature images from NYCMagicFan. Brian Cook and Maurice Evans aren't available, sadly. However, COOKIE MONSTER is!
• Here's the Playoffs page on the Magic's official website. The theme is BLUE & WHITE IGNITE.
• A FanHouse post by Tom Ziller that details why 10 NBA teams are legitimate contenders this season. For what it's worth, the Magic are one of those teams; the Raptors are not. I'm just saying.
• Ziller Stuff the Magic Dragon writes about why the Magic will win the championship
• Basketbawful, writing at Deadspin, discusses how the controversial ending to last night's Cavaliers/76ers game impacted the Eastern playoff picture.
• Vincent Thomas of SLAM previews the Eastern playoffs. He picks the Magic to win in 6 games, citing the Raptors' over-reliance on European players ("This is not FIBA") as his reason. Note that in the first draft of this post, published before the bracket was set, Thomas picked the 76ers to upset the Magic.
• T. Jose Caldeford thinks the Dwight Howard-versus-Chris Bosh matchup makes for the most compelling Eastern Conference playoff story:

  There will be no other series in the East where two great players will be going at each other on both ends of the floor (Arenas and James don't match up against each other), and furthermore, this is a match up about different styles of play, about quickness and well-roundedness against overwhelming size and strength.

  Hard to disagree with that assessment.

• JasonLynx posted this interesting thread at the MagicMadness forums. The Raptors lost their season series against the other Eastern contenders; the Magic won or tied all theirs.

Stay tuned to 3QC for more Orlando Magic playoffs coverage. I imagine we'll kick-off the site's relaunch on Friday with some playoff discussion in an open thread. I've already started going over some numbers. Sound good?

Good. See you tonight versus Atlanta. Go Magic.