Defense is the best strategy for Magic

ORLANDO -- After the Magic's Sunday morning shoot-around, Dwight Howard said if Orlando played its brand of basketball, the Magic can beat anybody.

But, Dwight, what exactly is Magic basketball?

"We run, move the ball and defend," Howard said after Game 3. "We play defense."

Ah, yes. Defense. The thing that everyone says wins championships. LeBron James and the Cavaliers are finding this out first hand in this East championship series. Defense is the reason the Magic are halfway to The Finals after their Game 3 99-89 win over the Cavs in Game 3.

(Miss the action? Catch the replay of Game 3 at Noon ET on NBA TV.)

Orlando held Cleveland to .372 from the field in Game 3, and although he scored 41 points, James needed 28 shots from the field and 24 free throw attempts to reach that total on Sunday.

But defense, really? The Orland Magic? Isn't this the best 3-point shooting team in the league at .381? That's what the Magic do best, right?

"People look at us as a 3-point shooting team," Orlando forward Rashard Lewis said. "People say we shoot too many threes, take too many jump shots, but they don't know what we do on the other end of the floor.

"The reason we get so many wins is we're a good defensive team."

When their 3-point shooting heads south down the Florida Turnpike as it did on Sunday (6-for-17) and when Howard isn't hitting 14 of his 19 free throw attempts (both career postseason highs), defense has been the one constant upon which the Magic could rely this season.

Led by Howard, the 2009 Defensive Player of the Year, defense is the thing the Magic did more efficiently than any team in the NBA this season. Not their Eastern Conference finals foe, the Cleveland Cavaliers, not the Boston Celtics, the team the Magic dispatched in the series prior, no one allowed fewer points (103.6) per 100 possessions than the Magic.

So, yes, defense. Although Orlando's grain-of-salt, salt-of-the-earth coach Stan Van Gundy, said his team's D in Game 3 was good, not exceptional.

"I thought our defense was better," Van Gundy said. "I'll know more after I watch the film. But they also missed some good looks.

"And there's a little bit of a caveat to the defense too, because when you take one guy and put him on the line 24 times, it is hard to say that your defense is great."

With the exception of a 16-5 Cavs run at the start of the second quarter, the Magic defense never let James and Co. get into an offensive flow or rhythm. Neither team really got into a rhythm in this one. The teams combined to commit 58 fouls and shoot 86 free throws. The Magic themselves attempted 51.

And it was chippy throughout. Howard flipped a forearm at Mo Williams. Zydrunas Ilgauskas put Howard in a quarter-Nelson and slung him to the deck. Howard, after one tense exchange, picked up his fifth technical of the postseason.

The Magic, however, have seem to have gotten into the heads of Cleveland's supporting cast. Orlando even split one open.

Williams, sporting a black left eye and four stitches from an Anthony Johnson elbow in the second quarter, said how the Cavs' matchups with the Magic have taken his team out of its comfort zone.

"These three games we won one and we felt like we should have one the first one," Williams said. "But every game, it wasn't a comfortable Cleveland Cavaliers game, even though we were playing well in spurts, we were aggressive and helping 'Bron collectively."

This is the second time in three games that James' supporting cast has come up short against the lengthy Magic. And the Cavs bench has been lacking as they scored only eight points in Game 3. Mickael Pietrus alone doubled that total.

With tall perimeter players such as Lewis, Pietrus and Hedo Turkoglu closing out quickly on their outside shooters, the Cavaliers have found very tall men in their sight lines when they want to line up a jumper.

And if Magic defenders do get beat, they get beat in a manner that funnels opposing players right into the best defensive safety net in the league: Howard.

As the Magic lead hovered between five and seven points midway through the fourth quarter, the Magic had the following lineup on the floor: Howard (6-foot-11), Turkoglu (6-foot-10), Lewis (6-foot-10), Pietrus (6-foot-6) and rookie Courtney Lee (6-foot-5).

Few teams, if any, in the NBA can match that combination of size, speed and athleticism.

"They create a lot of matchup problems," James said. "The way Rashard spaces the floor, our bigs are not used to it.

"They have some very big players that can shoot the ball. Also, they can drive too, if you close out on them a lot. They have done a good job of exploiting that."

The Magic have also done a good job of finding ways to win even if their other strengths have been minimized. Turkoglu was a chilly 1-for-11 from the field, but he grabbed 10 boards, dished seven assists and still scored 13 points thanks to numerous aggressive drives to the hole.

Howard, who spent most of the night in foul trouble, still made an impact in his 28 minutes on the floor by making 14 of his 19 free throw attempts. You could almost see the Cavs' hearts sink every time Howard sank a freebie.

And then there was Pietrus, who shadowed James throughout the night on defense and made the Cavs pay when they ignored him on offense.

"He's defending, spread the floor for us on offense," Lewis said. "He got some big rebounds, made some big free throws, but mostly he played great defense."

James, a singular talent, has at times, seemingly had to take on the Magic single handedly, especially in Game 3. Through a force of will, he made it to the line 24 times. He also dished nine assists and grabbed seven rebounds. His work load and the realization that he's the only one producing made him a bit tense in the postgame press conference.

"We've had a few games this season where if no one is making shots, then we don't look that good of a team," James said. "We are a very good shooting team, but we've not found a way to find our stroke."

And right now, the Cavs don't look or feel like the team that won 66 games this season.