Friday, January 29, 2010

Well, I Guess They Haven't Lost That Magic!







Sorry guys, I gotta do this. It was a real heart-thumping game between Orlando Magic and Boston Celtics last night at the Amway Arena in Orlando. After the loss of Magic over Celtics last Dec.25, and at home, plus the fact that Boston is a real tough team, who would thought that Orlando will have the victory? From the very start of the game, Celtics already leads 9 points ahead for only a couple of minutes. It has gotten worse when the lead came up to 16 at the 2nd half. Magic fans feeling hopeless, including me and my husband, it makes me wanna throw-up, seriously. We thought that when Jameer Nelson was able to make those 10 consecutive points in the first quarter, that they'd be able to atleast keep up. But the Celtics simply can't stop. 3 points everywhere from almost every member of the team. Ray Allen, Rasheed Wallace, Eddie House, oh my, I thought they had it all!
Then the 4th quarter, Magic made a big come back. With all those big and important guys of Celtics in foul trouble (4 each)...Magic took that advantage. We were even surprised to see Howard and Gortat play together! I guess that's Stan Van Gundy's strategy...to intimidate the Celtics bullies. Well, it works excellent. The use of the "twin towers" works very good.
I feel bad for Vince Carter. He's a great player but since he's been injured left and right, he has not been himself. He's been playing poorly. I even get upset and wondering why Van Gundy keeps on using him. I love Vince but he needs a break! He's just simply in a bad shape and needs enough rest to recover.
But what made us so excited is when Dwight's getting good shots, Gortat is doing a good job, JJ Redick put that 3-point dagger that tied the score in the last 15 seconds. Then the last 14.1 seconds is where the decision will be made. The original play was Redick will pass the ball to Carter and Carter will make the shot. But because of the strong defense of Celtics to Carter, Redick made the smart decision of passing the ball to Rashard Lewis who was just standing in the corner, and when he saw that Redick and Carter is being hustled by Pierce and Allen, he ran towards Redick and get the ball realizing that the time is running out. So, for the last 5 seconds, sweet Lew drive the ball to the basket and made 2 points leaving Celtics 1.3 seconds left to try to tie the score, hopefully. On the other hand I thought that maybe Van Gundy plays reverse psychology with the Celtics. Probably Celtics think that Carter will get the ball and so they guarded him strictly leaving Rashard open. In NBA, never under estimate the 1 second. A second can still make a lot of difference. And so Rondo passed the ball to Wallace for a catch and shoot play. Wallace, never get the chance to aim, missed the 3 point shot that sealed Magic to victory! Whew! What a game!!!!
In every game or sports, the mind plays the big part. it's all about strategy. I even thought that Garnett should have fouled Lewis and even he made the free throw shots, this will still give them atleast 3 or 4 seconds left and can tie the game for an overtime!
Oh well, that's smart playing I'd say...it's a real exciting game.
Congrats to Magic. So, I guess, they haven't lost that magic!

1 comment:

Peter said...

I'm glad you and Steve had such a rush watching this game. Thanks for sharing your enthusiasm.