 |
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Big Fourth Quarters Leads Orlando to 32-Point Win
|
 POSTGAME QUOTES
 Orlando Magic Head Coach Brian Hill:“That wasn’t a very artistic game but it was a good win and I wasn’t very pleased with our offensive production all night long other than the way we shot. I feel our defense after the first quarter was pretty darn good and almost exceptional in the second half. Our offense could have been better in the third quarter it would have made things a lot easier but to hold them to 10 and 14 in the last two quarters was a great job by our guys. I thought Tony Battie did an outstanding job on the glass and offensively and Dwight took the challenge defensively. The guys we had to stop we stopped, Shaun May, Okafor, and Raymond Felton. Matt Carroll got loose and got some looks to the basket, basically all they were getting was jump shots, so we can live with that.” On keeping Dwight shooting inside the paint “It won’t be hard he won’t want to ruin his percentage for the rest of the year. He’ll want to stay at 1,000 percent from the three point line, so I think we can convince him to stay inside.” On having quick centers “It makes it a lot easier but it can also give the other guys a false sense of security that they don’t have to work as hard and can just let guys go to the basket. Because every time he comes to block a shot he opening up his guy and that’s where your team defense comes in and you have to help each other. It’s a great option to have guys like Dwight and Darko in there and can run to block shots.” On the Magic’s winning streak “I’m happy we came out of that tailspin. Washington game we had every opportunity to win and now we’ve won three straight since then, Sunday’s game will be a big game for us before we get to the road. If we can win Sunday’s game that will give us four games out of this set of five and give us a little momentum going out to the west coast. It’s nice to be the first team in the east with 20 wins, we’ll take that and see if we can just keep getting better.” On the health of Keyon Dooling and Grant Hill “I would say based on today’s workouts, Grant is probably is closer to coming back than Keyon is. I think Keyon is still nursing the Achilles a little bit. Grant should be cleared to practice and take contact tomorrow. He felt good today, we’ll see how he handles practice tomorrow, I think he’ll be back for Sunday’s game.” On Dwight being on the All-Star team “Dwight belongs on the All-Star team. Is he the best center in the east? Shaq hasn’t played so I think its very hard to compare the two of the them and say that one is better than the other when he really hasn’t played all year long. There’s no question in my mind that he belongs on the All-Star team whether it’s the fans vote or coaches placing him on there, he defiantly deserves that honor this year.”  Orlando Magic Guard Jameer Nelson:“Earlier in the year, we weren’t a good third quarter team and I think we wanted to change that as a unit. We’ve been getting stops and holding teams to lower amounts than they’re used to. I think the team is taking pride in their defense right now. People talk about how we have a lot of scorers. We’ve got a lot of guys helping each other right now. And that’s one of the keys to our success right now.” “Once you’ve got a team down, you don’t want to let them back. We knew this team is a tough team to play because they’re the type of team that’s going to play hard, the type of team that’s going to play the same way no matter hard. We just go out and play basketball.” (On giving Dwight pointers on 3 pt. shots) “It was all him. He gets all the credit for shooting that three because if he would have missed it, I wouldn’t have taken credit for that.”  Orlando Magic Guard Carlos Arroyo:“I felt comfortable tonight; it was a matter of time. It’s something to stay positive through and things are going to fall in place. We’ve got to go out there and keep playing hard.” “Obviously we come in here and watch film and we understand what we have to work on in the second half. We get better out there and it helps our chance at winning. We see where we need to get better at halftime and we understand that it’s two halves. In the second half, we have to take advantage of what we do when we come in here and going out there and following the game plan and getting better.” (Any extra pressure on bobblehead night?) “No it was one of those nights. Little by little, I’ll go back to playing my game. It’s special though, the bobblehead, I am truly grateful to the franchise to do those kind of things to me and I am always going to be truly grateful.”  Orlando Magic Guard Trevor Ariza:“We see what we’re doing wrong in the first half. We come in here and correct it, watch film on it to see what we have to do to turn it up, to get better at it.” (On his dunk) “Well the lane just kind of opened up. (Okafor) kind of got there late and I had a step on him.” “In the first half, we kind of slacked off a little bit. Coach was on us about that and we had to bring the intensity in the second half.” “They kind of weren’t shooting the ball well. But we had to do what we do to get the win.”  Charlotte Bobcats Head Coach Bernie Bickertstaff:On the loss: “24 points isn’t going to get it done. Not in a half. And we really kind of gave in to it and I thought we really played soft when the shots weren’t going in. That’s not our character. If you score 24 points in the second half, that won’t get it. I think we were six down at the end of the half shooting 34%, that won’t win.” On the shots they were taking: ”We had some pretty good shots. I thought down inside there were key situations where we have to learn that Matt (Carroll) had the hot hand. He was 5 for 8 and 3-of-4 from the three point line, had just made a shot, and then we took the ball and he was open in the corner and somebody else took the shot instead of passing it to the one guy who was making shots in those situations.” On Dwight Howard’s performance: “He had a pretty good performance. That’s what he’s supposed to do.” On defending the Magic: “Jameer (Nelson) made a big difference for them and Dwight is so active. Primoz (Brezec) had nine rebounds in the first half, Primoz was getting after it. But it’s just so long that you can contain Dwight. Dwight has an assortment of ways to get his stuff especially offensive rebounds. They’re a good basketball team. If they get (Grant) Hill back and he’s healthy, they’re going to create some problems.”  Charlotte Bobcats Forward Sean May: “In the first half, we shot poorly but we were still in it. The only person that made any shots tonight was Matt Carroll on a consistent basis. I think we had one game earlier this season where the whole team played bad. You hate to play like that especially against a team you feel you match up well against.” “Tonight every time I caught the ball, I knew they would send Jameer or a guard to double which they didn’t do last time. I just didn’t knock down shots. I missed five or six jump shots in the first half and didn’t help the case in the second. I played poorly and our team played poorly. We have a little time to correct things and go to work at practice.” “We have to think about this but not dwell on this too long. We have four games of practice which is going to help this team. Guys are still banged up and Jeff (McInnis) is just coming in. We have to get guys healthy.” “It is tough. He (Gerald Wallace) is our energy guy. That is where we stem from his play…his leadership on how he plays and how he puts his body on the line. Not having him out there is an adjustment and hopefully he won’t be out too long.” “Anytime as a big you pick up two quick ones (fouls) you become more hesitant and more tentative. I think it just set the tone for him the rest of the game. Everybody knows that is not how he normally plays like. He always wants to play well especially with this rivalry him and Dwight have going. It wasn’t his night and he can’t dwell on it.”  Charlotte Bobcats Forward Matt Carroll: “They made some adjustments and played tough defense. They were rotating and doubling down in the post. They made us take quick shots in the second half. We didn’t put up much of a fight in the second half.” “I don’t think it was energy. They were playing hard and we were playing hard. In the second half we just weren’t making shots. I thought their defense really picked up their intensity a little bit. We really didn’t know what shots we were going to get. They took away the post and rushed out to our shooters a lot.” “When you lose that badly it is embarrassing. This one hurt. We see that they are beating us and they are kind of laughing at the end of the game. That is embarrassing for any professional team. We are better than how we played. It just makes you mad.” “I could’ve guessed that was his (Howard’s) first career three pointer. When he hit it I said to myself that it has got to be his first three. That was just an unbelievable fluke play. They designed it up and that was a heck-u-va play by the coach and for him to make that shot was even better.” POSTGAME NOTES • The Magic improve to 20-14 on the season with a 106-74 victory over the Bobcats at Amway Arena. • Tonight’s win was the largest margin of victory of the season, 32 points. The previous high was 29 on 12/30/06 vs. Miami. • The Magic held the Bobcats to only 29.1 percent shooting from the field. That is the lowest field goal percentage for a game by an opponent this season. Orlando shot 57.4 percent from the floor which is just shy of their season high 59.3 percent. • Dwight Howard tallied his 25th double-double of the season with 22 points and 12 rebounds. Through 11 career games vs. the Bobcats, Howard is averaging 16.5 points per game (182 points) and 15.0 rebounds per game (165). • Trevor Ariza had a strong outing with 10 points and nine rebounds on 4-of-6 shooting from the field. Tony Battie tied a season high 10 rebounds. • Charlotte scored only 24 points in the second half. The all-time low for points in the second half by an opponent is 19, vs. Miami 3/26/00, that is also an NBA record. • Orlando improves to 6-0 with Keith Bogans in the starting line-up. • The Magic recorded a season high 33 points in the first quarter. The previous high was 32 @ Indiana on 11/10/06. |
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Pre-Game Preview: 
Copyright 2012
NBA Media Ventures, LLC | Turner Sports Interactive, Inc.All rights reserved. No portion of NBA.com may be duplicated, redistributed or
manipulated in any form. By accessing any information beyond this page, you agree to abide by the NBA.com Privacy Policy / Your
California PrivacyRights and Terms of Use. |
Ad Choices
NBA.com is part of Turner Sports Digital, part of the Turner Sports & Entertainment Digital Network.
Advertise on NBA.com | Career Opportunities | Help
NBA.com is part of Turner Sports Digital, part of the Turner Sports & Entertainment Digital Network.
Advertise on NBA.com | Career Opportunities | Help