The Orlando Magic: This is the kind of loss that could convince Ben Q. Rock to change the name of his blog to "Fourth Quarter Collapse." Much like the Nuggets in their Game 5 failure in L.A., the Magic played the Cavaliers to a standstill through three quarters -- despite falling behind 32-10 nine minutes into the game -- and were actually up by a point going into the fourth. And that's when Orlando crumbled under Cleveland's defensive pressure.

On the Magic's first fourth-quarter possession, Anthony Johnson had his shot blocked by Boobie Gibson, which forced a shot clock violation. That one play seemed to set a tone for the final 12 minutes, during which Orlando couldn't get on track offensively and couldn't get a stop on the other end. The bottom line was, they were just straight-up outplayed, not to mention outscored 34-23 on the way to a 112-102 defeat. Basically, it was the second-worst ending I saw yesterday...the first-worst being this conclusion from Charles Barkley Shut and Jam Gaiden:


Defensively, the Magic weren't able to stop Cleveland's three-point shooters (who went 9-for-18 on the night), and they couldn't do ANYTHING with LeBron James (37 points, 14 rebounds, 12 assists). They did manage to shut down Ben Wallace (zero points, 0-for-2), but that's about it. Of course, things might have gone a wee bit differently if not for...

Orlando's free throw shooting: The Magicians bricked 13 freebies, which is a pretty significant number in an 10-point loss. And 10 of that basker's dozen worth of misses were split up between Orlando's big three of Dwight Howard (five misses), Rashard Lewis (three) and Hedo Turkoglu (two). Then too, another problem was...

Orlando's three-point shooting: While the Cavs were knocking down half of their three-bombs, the Magi were hitting only 32 percent (8-for-25) of theirs. Considering how many long-distance shots they take, it seems to me that Orlando really needs to shoot 40 percent or better from downtown to win. On the subject of shooting blanks from distance, I should probably address the woes of...

Rafer Alston: My oh my this guy was awful last night: 1-for-10 from the field, 1-for-7 from beyond the arc, 3 points, 4 assists, 3 turnovers and 4 fouls. Oh, and he had BY FAR the worst plus-minus score (-20) of the night. (Hedo Turkoglu was a distant second at -11). And yeah, a lot of that was racked up when the Magic fell behind by 22 in the first quarter, you can see by this game flow chart that Orlando wasn't making much of anything happen when Skip to My Lou was on the floor. And that's becoming a pattern, as Ben. Q. Rock pointed out: "Rafer has shot 6-of-27 in the three games in Cleveland this series, which has me wiping egg off my face after highlighting his usually outstanding marksmanship in The Q over the last several seasons. Poor shooting, poor decision-making, and poor defense from Rafer tonight. Not even Anthony Johnson's steady play -- yeah, he shot 2-of-6, but it seemed better than that -- mitigated Rafer's poor showing." Which brings up an intersting point...

Stan Van Gundy: Why did he go to Rafer in the fourth quarter despite the fact that Alston was having the kind of night that was only slightly less humiliating than starting the first slap fight in NHL history? There HAD to be a better crunchtime lineup, right? Mr. Rock thinks so: "Rafer's poor play had me questioning why he was even on the floor with the game on the line during the fourth period. Either he has it or he doesn't, and tonight, he didn't. Quite obviously. The Magic have had some success with Hedo Turkoglu running point-forward, using Courtney Lee as the nominal point guard with Mickael Pietrus in the backcourt. Very, very surprised not to see that lineup on the floor late in the game, and I can't think of any disadvantages to using it, frankly. Lee can handle either Williams or Gibson, with Turkoglu trying to check the other one as Pietrus works (futilely?) to defend James. And before pointing out that Turkoglu hasn't the quickness to effectively defend those guys, let me remind you that they're essentially stand-still shooters in late-game situations, as James gets the ball at the top of the key and goes to work. He's the one doing the driving and the kicking, not them. Turk, at 6'10", has the size and length to effectively close out on either player. So again, I ask: 'why didn't the Magic go point-guard-free at the end of the game?'"

Thursday night lacktion report: Even this titanic Game 5 clash was not free of lacktivity, as Chris will now prove: "Sasha Pavlovic moved some building blocks to the tune of 'Korobeniki' for a 58-second Mario, while Tarence Kinsey did his part to will the Crabs to victory, eating a power-up mushroom quickly for a 2-second Super Mario! In his three lacktive appearances so far this round, Tarence has continued to mash the NES Advantage with Marios in all of those games, a total of a mere 19 seconds played so far for the aforementioned matches!"

Cleveland: Remember how almost a month ago I posted that Cleveland tourism video? Well, an alternate version made it onto TNT last night. Hey, TNT crew. I beat you by 24 days. I'm just sayin'. Here's the video:


Ron Artest: Basketbawful reader Yiping said that this was the best 4 minutes of his entire lifetime. Maybe it'll be yours too...as Crazy Pills video-blogs from his bed.

Labels: Cleveland Cavaliers, free throws, Orlando Magic, Worst of the Night