ESPN’s Daily Dime highlights Magic for two consecutive days
Howard Shows He Has The Superhero (And Villain) Stuff
Courtesy of ESPN.com's Daily Dime and J.A. Adande
LOS ANGELES -- Every time Dwight Howard visits Staples Center he makes sure to look at the retired Lakers jerseys hanging high up on the southern wall. There are enough impressive names representing history to start an annex of the Basketball Hall of Fame, names like West, Baylor, Abdul-Jabbar and Johnson.
But Howard always zeroes in one jersey, No. 13. Wilt Chamberlain.
"I always wanted to meet him," Howard said. "I read his books. I'm a real big Wilt Chamberlain fan. He was bigger than life.
"Me and him, as far as on the court, the way we play the game, we've got some similarities: our size, our strength, our ability to dominate. He had all of that. I try to pattern my game after his."
On the NBA family tree, Howard isn't the direct offspring of Chamberlain, but he's in the lineage, a descendant of Shaquille O'Neal. But he's taking it to the next step, the natural evolution. The league didn't keep track of blocked shots during Chamberlain's prime, and O'Neal never led the league in rebounding. Howard currently leads the NBA in both categories.
His numbers are becoming more and more ridiculous. In Orlando's 95-88 victory over the Clippers on Monday, Howard had his third double double-double of the season (that's at least 20 points and 20 rebounds) and second in as many games, with 23 points and 22 rebounds. Oh yeah, he also had six blocked shots and four assists.
"I don't know how many more statements Dwight can make," Magic coach Stan Van Gundy said. "Another great game."
One sequence in the Magic's comeback victory showed just how easily Howard can take over a game in so many ways. First, he elevated to eye-at-the-rim level to throw down an alley-oop dunk. At the other end, he discouraged an Al Thornton layup, then collected the rebound. He ran down to the low post, caught the ball, backed down Marcus Camby, drew two more defenders and passed out to an open Keith Bogans for a 3-pointer.
Clippers power forward Zach Randolph, who spent more than his share of time guarding Howard, called him the "best center in the game."
That prompted a quick cough from Marcus Camby two lockers over.
"Second best," Randolph amended. "My partner over there."
"Oh no, that was just the deodorant," Camby said.
Camby really couldn't take offense to Randolph's statement. It's clear right now there's Howard, then everyone else.
"He's tough, physical, jumps high. He's strong. Just, everything ...
"And his offense is getting better, too."
Witness a spin-move, lefty-bank shot Howard unleashed on Randolph in the first half. It almost wasn't fair.
Howard also inherited O'Neal's sense of humor, which might make him the most important player in the league. Someone needs to lighten the mood in the NBA the way O'Neal did almost single-handedly for more than a decade. O'Neal might have passed the torch to Howard in their legendary dance-off during All-Star Weekend in New Orleans last season. Now Howard has taken the torch and is flying around the stadium like that guy in the Opening Ceremonies of the Beijing Games.
He took over All-Star Weekend in Las Vegas two seasons ago by winning the dunk contest with his Superman slam. If nothing else, it set the stage for this raucous debate on NBA TV about whether Howard or O'Neal had the right to claim the Superman moniker. (The verdict: Shaq.)
Even though Howard did don the cape at the dunk contest, and does make references to Kryptonite and drinking "Superman juice," and his agent is having discussions with DC Comics about some type of tie-in, he claims he never officially gave himself the title.
"It was given to me, first by my teammates," Howard said. "I never ordained myself 'Superman.' I'm sorry, Shaq."
It's not as if Howard doesn't have plenty of other characters he can adopt.
He does a range of imitations, from his preacher father to Stan Van Gundy to Rasputia from "Norbit." But my favorite is Sho'nuff, the Shogun of Harlem, from the 1980s classic "The Last Dragon." Howard showed up for a team flight in full Sho'nuff attire earlier this season, and he did his Sho'nuff impersonation on demand Monday night.
He's very accommodating. He tried to satisfy both the media and the fans simultaneously before the game, agreeing to an interview while signing autographs and posing for pictures.
It's as if he's running for office. He might not have bought out chunks of network prime time the way our president-elect did, but you'll be seeing a lot more of Howard in the coming months. Howard came to Los Angeles early to shoot a McDonald's commercial. He'll be in T-Mobile ads with Charles Barkley and Dwyane Wade that begin airing next week.
And he'll be your starting center for the Eastern Conference in the All-Star Game in February.
The new face of the league rests atop his broad shoulders, the legacy of Wilt Chamberlain is secure in his hands.
Just Like the Coach Drew It Up
Courtesy of ESPN.com's Daily Dime and John Hollinger
PORTLAND -- It was a gift from the heavens, and Stan Van Gundy knew it. The Orlando coach could hardly contain his glee after Hedo Turkoglu's contested, desperate fadeaway 3 banked in with 0.3 seconds left to cap a 109-108 comeback win in Portland.
"That was just brilliant, brilliant coaching down the stretch," said Van Gundy. "That is exactly the play we drew up, and we told him to shoot it off the glass if he could get the angle on it. That's exactly what we wanted, so I have to give myself all the credit."
Having cut an eight-point deficit to two, Orlando got the ball back with five seconds left and designed a play for Rashard Lewis or Jameer Nelson to get a shot. When neither came open, the final option was for the inbounder, Turkoglu, to throw it to Dwight Howard at the elbow, get it back and try to create a shot off the bounce. After a couple dribbles to his right, his leaning hoist from the top of the key caromed in to stun a raucous Rose Garden crowd.
"There's no question we got lucky at the end," said Van Gundy. "If you're [Portland] you have to roll your eyes because we threw one in. But we had to do some very good things and show some resolve down eight with two minutes left to give ourselves a chance to throw one in."
Orlando gave itself that chance by switching defenses and trapping Brandon Roy at half court in the final two minutes to get the ball out of his hands, after he'd shredded every other look the league's third-ranked defense threw at him.
"I'm sometimes not a very bright guy, and it took him to get to 30 before I said, 'We can't contain him,'" said Van Gundy. "We tried every scheme in the book, so we said, 'To hell with it -- we're going to trap him and make somebody else make a play.'"
Nobody else did, partly because it's a tactic that a Blazers insider told me they haven't seen much. I guarantee they'll see more of it. Portland seemed unsure what to do, and on the final trip the Blazers kept trying to force the ball back to Roy rather than attacking four-on-three. As a result, the Blazers bled out the shot clock on their final possession to cap a string of four empty trips in the final 2:15.
"When they doubled on Brandon, we're supposed to send a player to the middle and we would have had an advantage," said Blazers coach Nate McMillan. "We have sets to counter and to attack that double-team."
As for the Magic, they improved to 17-5 by handing Portland its first home loss of the season. And now they have a much more compelling case for the backhanded compliment of "King of the Other 27" -- the battle to be the fourth-best squad in a league being dominated by the Lakers, Cavs and Celtics.
Click here to watch the highlights of the Magic's thrilling victory.
Courtesy of ESPN.com's Daily Dime and Marc Stein
San Antonio and Dallas, apparently unaware that many precincts on the NBA map no longer see the significance of their decade-long rivalry as Texas-sized, conspired to give us no less than a double-overtime classic that would hold up well against any of their best battles. A few highlights: Jose Juan Barea somehow zooming to the rim faster than Tony Parker in the fourth quarter; Bruce Bowen coming off the bench to take turns shadowing Barea, Jason Terry and Dirk Nowitzki and drain a backbreaking 3 from the corner on the only shot he took in the second half; and both teams getting too absorbed in the drama to make any lasting fuss about Terry's hard foul on Parker in the open floor. Soaking in his team's eventual 133-126 triumph, Spurs coach Gregg Popovich insisted: "I don't know how it could be any better."
Did someone say better? The Orlando Magic, playing on the second night of a back-to-back, reminded us yet again that you can't have a conversation about road juggernauts in this league without mentioning them very early in the conversation. The Magic got a late trio of triples from Jameer Nelson, Rashard Lewis and Hedo Turkoglu to turn a 108-100 deficit into an improbable 109-108 victory over Portland. (Did we mention that the Blazers were unbeaten at home before this one?) In the unlikely event that you haven't already seen the highlight, it's worth mentioning that Turkoglu even unintentionally went Tim Duncan on us and smooched his late 3 off the window from the top of the key.
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LOS ANGELES -- Every time Dwight Howard visits Staples Center he makes sure to look at the retired Lakers jerseys hanging high up on the southern wall. There are enough impressive names representing history to start an annex of the Basketball Hall of Fame, names like West, Baylor, Abdul-Jabbar and Johnson.
But Howard always zeroes in one jersey, No. 13. Wilt Chamberlain.
"I always wanted to meet him," Howard said. "I read his books. I'm a real big Wilt Chamberlain fan. He was bigger than life.
"Me and him, as far as on the court, the way we play the game, we've got some similarities: our size, our strength, our ability to dominate. He had all of that. I try to pattern my game after his."
On the NBA family tree, Howard isn't the direct offspring of Chamberlain, but he's in the lineage, a descendant of Shaquille O'Neal. But he's taking it to the next step, the natural evolution. The league didn't keep track of blocked shots during Chamberlain's prime, and O'Neal never led the league in rebounding. Howard currently leads the NBA in both categories.
His numbers are becoming more and more ridiculous. In Orlando's 95-88 victory over the Clippers on Monday, Howard had his third double double-double of the season (that's at least 20 points and 20 rebounds) and second in as many games, with 23 points and 22 rebounds. Oh yeah, he also had six blocked shots and four assists.
"I don't know how many more statements Dwight can make," Magic coach Stan Van Gundy said. "Another great game."
One sequence in the Magic's comeback victory showed just how easily Howard can take over a game in so many ways. First, he elevated to eye-at-the-rim level to throw down an alley-oop dunk. At the other end, he discouraged an Al Thornton layup, then collected the rebound. He ran down to the low post, caught the ball, backed down Marcus Camby, drew two more defenders and passed out to an open Keith Bogans for a 3-pointer.
Clippers power forward Zach Randolph, who spent more than his share of time guarding Howard, called him the "best center in the game."
That prompted a quick cough from Marcus Camby two lockers over.
"Second best," Randolph amended. "My partner over there."
"Oh no, that was just the deodorant," Camby said.
Camby really couldn't take offense to Randolph's statement. It's clear right now there's Howard, then everyone else.
"He's tough, physical, jumps high. He's strong. Just, everything ...
"And his offense is getting better, too."
Witness a spin-move, lefty-bank shot Howard unleashed on Randolph in the first half. It almost wasn't fair.
Howard also inherited O'Neal's sense of humor, which might make him the most important player in the league. Someone needs to lighten the mood in the NBA the way O'Neal did almost single-handedly for more than a decade. O'Neal might have passed the torch to Howard in their legendary dance-off during All-Star Weekend in New Orleans last season. Now Howard has taken the torch and is flying around the stadium like that guy in the Opening Ceremonies of the Beijing Games.
He took over All-Star Weekend in Las Vegas two seasons ago by winning the dunk contest with his Superman slam. If nothing else, it set the stage for this raucous debate on NBA TV about whether Howard or O'Neal had the right to claim the Superman moniker. (The verdict: Shaq.)
Even though Howard did don the cape at the dunk contest, and does make references to Kryptonite and drinking "Superman juice," and his agent is having discussions with DC Comics about some type of tie-in, he claims he never officially gave himself the title.
"It was given to me, first by my teammates," Howard said. "I never ordained myself 'Superman.' I'm sorry, Shaq."
It's not as if Howard doesn't have plenty of other characters he can adopt.
He does a range of imitations, from his preacher father to Stan Van Gundy to Rasputia from "Norbit." But my favorite is Sho'nuff, the Shogun of Harlem, from the 1980s classic "The Last Dragon." Howard showed up for a team flight in full Sho'nuff attire earlier this season, and he did his Sho'nuff impersonation on demand Monday night.
He's very accommodating. He tried to satisfy both the media and the fans simultaneously before the game, agreeing to an interview while signing autographs and posing for pictures.
It's as if he's running for office. He might not have bought out chunks of network prime time the way our president-elect did, but you'll be seeing a lot more of Howard in the coming months. Howard came to Los Angeles early to shoot a McDonald's commercial. He'll be in T-Mobile ads with Charles Barkley and Dwyane Wade that begin airing next week.
And he'll be your starting center for the Eastern Conference in the All-Star Game in February.
The new face of the league rests atop his broad shoulders, the legacy of Wilt Chamberlain is secure in his hands.
Just Like the Coach Drew It Up
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Courtesy of ESPN.com's Daily Dime and John Hollinger
PORTLAND -- It was a gift from the heavens, and Stan Van Gundy knew it. The Orlando coach could hardly contain his glee after Hedo Turkoglu's contested, desperate fadeaway 3 banked in with 0.3 seconds left to cap a 109-108 comeback win in Portland.
"That was just brilliant, brilliant coaching down the stretch," said Van Gundy. "That is exactly the play we drew up, and we told him to shoot it off the glass if he could get the angle on it. That's exactly what we wanted, so I have to give myself all the credit."
Having cut an eight-point deficit to two, Orlando got the ball back with five seconds left and designed a play for Rashard Lewis or Jameer Nelson to get a shot. When neither came open, the final option was for the inbounder, Turkoglu, to throw it to Dwight Howard at the elbow, get it back and try to create a shot off the bounce. After a couple dribbles to his right, his leaning hoist from the top of the key caromed in to stun a raucous Rose Garden crowd.
"There's no question we got lucky at the end," said Van Gundy. "If you're [Portland] you have to roll your eyes because we threw one in. But we had to do some very good things and show some resolve down eight with two minutes left to give ourselves a chance to throw one in."
Orlando gave itself that chance by switching defenses and trapping Brandon Roy at half court in the final two minutes to get the ball out of his hands, after he'd shredded every other look the league's third-ranked defense threw at him.
"I'm sometimes not a very bright guy, and it took him to get to 30 before I said, 'We can't contain him,'" said Van Gundy. "We tried every scheme in the book, so we said, 'To hell with it -- we're going to trap him and make somebody else make a play.'"
Nobody else did, partly because it's a tactic that a Blazers insider told me they haven't seen much. I guarantee they'll see more of it. Portland seemed unsure what to do, and on the final trip the Blazers kept trying to force the ball back to Roy rather than attacking four-on-three. As a result, the Blazers bled out the shot clock on their final possession to cap a string of four empty trips in the final 2:15.
"When they doubled on Brandon, we're supposed to send a player to the middle and we would have had an advantage," said Blazers coach Nate McMillan. "We have sets to counter and to attack that double-team."
As for the Magic, they improved to 17-5 by handing Portland its first home loss of the season. And now they have a much more compelling case for the backhanded compliment of "King of the Other 27" -- the battle to be the fourth-best squad in a league being dominated by the Lakers, Cavs and Celtics.
Click here to watch the highlights of the Magic's thrilling victory.
Courtesy of ESPN.com's Daily Dime and Marc Stein
