38. Magic Raptors Final 3/15/24. 103. 81. Final. 113
Paolo Banchero was brilliant for long stretches in Friday’s 113-103 win over the Toronto Raptors on the road.
He rushed to steal a pass for a breakaway dunk during a first-quarter dunk.. He stood up to shoot, then quickly wrapped around the defense to find Jalen Suggs for a 3 point on another.
His exclamation point came when he accepted a pick and roll pass and sped up to the edge for a one-handed jam. It was the kind of game that could get everyone moving.
Banchero had an impressive 17 points, nine rebounds and eight assists, flirting with his second career triple-double and putting all of his abilities on full display.
This is what Magic needed. The play required Banchero to be a passer, absorbing pressure and passing the ball around the horn to open shots. He’s willing to be that passer and the Magic’s offense has thrived for long stretches.
During the telling third quarter, Banchero scored 11 points and dished out half of those eight assists. Orlando came out of the locker room and left his mark on the game to walk away and never really look back.
Orlando continued to persevere and find a way to score and stay ahead despite these setbacks.
“That’s growth” coach Jamahl Mosley said. “But that’s who he is. He’s a young man who is able to recognize how the game is played and not put his head down and get discouraged. He knows how much we believe in him, he knows how much his teammates and what he can do. And that’s what we saw there.
But maybe that’s the point. The Magic know what they are capable of and when the team doesn’t reach that level of focus and intensity, something seems to be missing.
The first half was difficult and disjointed. The Magic were never completely locked down. The Raptors hung around. There were many errors to correct.
As brilliant as Banchero was with his overall game, he shot 5 of 15 from the floor, weaving his way into the paint and missing shots at the rim against a crowded defense. He had six turnovers in a sloppy game where he struggled to find outlets on the double teams the Raptors constantly threw at him.
The juxtaposition of Banchero having eight assists and dishing out assists to energize the Magic’s offense with his six turnovers leading directly to the Raptors’ fast break opportunities to keep them in the game directly alludes to the problem the Magic faced in this 10 point victory.
Orlando is a playoff team. The Magic are capable of playing sloppily and still winning with some comfort against teams at the bottom of the standings. They have played a lot in recent weeks (and there are still two more to go before a four-team Western Conference postseason series arrives at the Kia Center.
But that’s no longer the question, is it? The Magic are trying to play at a higher level. They are trying to prepare for the Playoffs.
And so, games like this are more about the Magic plays against this norm. It’s more about the Magic playing with the right focus and attention to detail.
Orlando won quite comfortably in Toronto on Friday night. The Magic took a lead of as many as 19 points in the fourth quarter. They locked down well enough to pull away and lead for most of the game, trailing by nine points early in the game.
Again, the Raptors cut that deficit to nine points pretty quickly. The game was never tight enough to seem truly threatening. The Magic still won this game.
But not locking and lazing around during the game was a bit worrying. There’s still a lot to clean up.
“We have to have the right mindset before Sunday and in every game honestly, because every game matters to us,” Franz Wagner said after Friday’s victory. “I thought our approach was solid tonight. I thought the Raptors fought really hard and played a really good game. We need to be a little better on Sunday.”
It’s not just that Gary Trent Jr. scored 31 points and made 7 of 11 3-pointers. Someone had to score for the undermanned Raptors.
This is more than Orlando made 15 turnovers for 20 points in Toronto. Additionally, the Raptors, the league leader in fast-break scoring, scored 20 of their 37 points on fast-breaks in the first half.
The Magic still did very well to win the game.
Orlando still had 52 points in the paint and held Toronto to 42 points in the paint. The Raptors were 13 of 18 on fast blocks. That left them 25 for 63 (39.7 percent) when not in transition. The Magic held firm on their identity and shut out the Raptors in the half-court and in the paint.
It’s more that the Magic were sloppy and seemingly lackadaisical for long stretches, giving away their lead instead of extending it and putting the game out of reach. That’s because the Magic’s mistakes led directly to the Raptors’ success. Toronto played well and put pressure on Orlando’s offense, but Toronto was completely dependent on Orlando’s mistakes.
The Magic’s attention seemed to wonder throughout the game.
Every time it looked like the Magic were ready to pull away for the win, they suffered a series of turnovers – whether it was one of Banchero’s six turnovers or Wagner’s four turnovers (he took the Magic with 14 of their 19 points in the game). first half). They would get lost during the transition and lose track of the shooters during the transition.
This was not a team the Magic could take lightly. They were going to fight and not get away with it so easily.
“We were in this situation a year ago, I don’t think we can ever lose that perspective,” Suggs said after Friday’s win. “To do that is not only disrespectful to them, but also to the game. We’ve done a good job not to get to that point.”
There was simply a lack of attention to detail and intensity. Assistant coach Bret Brielmaier brushed off questions from Bally Sports Florida reporter Kendra Douglas at halftime about the offense and said the focus would be on the team’s urgency in defense.
The Magic weren’t perfect in the second half, but they played with more urgency. This helped the Magic take final control of the game.
The Magic won the game. But the kind of mistakes they made throughout would almost certainly cost them in the playoffs. Just because they can get by now doesn’t mean these problems don’t persist.
The Orlando Magic let that standard slip and it cost the team dearly in last weekend’s battles against the New York Knicks and Indiana Pacers. It was an unfair assessment of the team’s season so far and what Orlando is capable of. But it still persists.
If this is a playoff team, only one metric matters.
No one should be upset about the Magic winning. In the end, that’s what matters. All victories count equally. And Orlando didn’t need to play crucial minutes or sweat this game.
But that’s also the point. For every good thing the Magic did Friday night, they did something else that simply showed a lack of urgency and attention to detail. The kind of things that will cost them dearly in the Playoffs.
Following. Isaac huge playoff push 3/16/24. Jonathan Isaac will be huge for the Orlando Magic playoffs. dark
And that’s the standard the team plays to. Orlando plays against itself and against this standard much more than against an opponent like Toronto. To win or not.
