Can't stop the bigs...

[Diesel]

“We allowed too many continuations on the defensive end and Howard continued to control the paint on the offensive and defensive ends,” Atlanta coach Mike Woodson said. “I played all of our bigs against him to see what we could come up with.”

Howard had a monster game against us. IF he could hit free throws, they would have probably blown us out.

There's is nothing special about that Magic team. We shot the same percentage on them. We rebounded about the same. The difference is the low post dominance of superman. When they really learn how to use him, they will be trouble. But for us... we have Morris, Zaza, Hunter, and Horf. In a regular season game, I think he'd foul 3 of the 4 out. I don't know if the problem is size or quality but we have to find some help up front. Or we better become an all out run team.

[DrReality]

MAGIC 109, HAWKS 103: Prelude for division battle

By Sekou Smith

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Tuesday, October 21, 2008

According to the schedule, the Hawks are still playing preseason games. Unfortunately, that wasn’t an elixir for the Hawks’ battered and bruised bodies after Monday’s 109-103 loss to Southeast Division rival Orlando at Philips Arena.

Eight of the 10 players who started the game were on the floor for the final tense minutes —- Orlando’s Jameer Nelson fouled out and Mickael Pietrus gave way to rookie Courtney Lee.

With the teams playing to win and send a message in anticipation of the Oct. 29 regular-season opener for both in Orlando, the bloody results should have been expected.

“We don’t have the luxury of sitting key guys and all that; we’re still trying to get our rotations down and get our chemistry right,” Hawks All-Star Joe Johnson said as head athletic trainer Wally Blase dabbed ointment on a nasty scratch that ran from his left armpit all the way to his abdomen. We don’t have but one game left before the regular season starts, so we have to buckle down.

“This is the team we play first, and I definitely thought it was as a good test for us. And a good indicator of what’s to come the rest of the way.”

The Magic got huge nights from All-Star center Dwight Howard (29 points, 11 rebounds and two blocks) and Rashard Lewis (25 points, eight rebounds and three assists).

Lee was huge off the bench, finishing with 13 points, four rebounds and three assists.

But the story of the night was the Hawks’ inability to stop any of the Magic players who hit the floor.

Stan Van Gundy’s team was relentless going to the basket and shot 39 free throws. Howard, the former Southwest Atlanta Christian star, made 13 of his 22 free throw attempts for a night when the Hawks ran through their entire allotment of big men trying to slow him down.

“Our defense stunk to-night,” Johnson said, “especially us guards. We put ourselves in a tough situation by not being able to keep anybody in front of us. And we put our bigs in tough spots because they didn’t want to leave Dwight.”

As porous as the Hawks’ defense was, they still had chances to rally for the win.

But they couldn’t execute down the stretch, the worst offense being Mike Bibby’s errant 3-pointer with 14.9 seconds to play and the Hawks trailing 103-105 with plenty of clock to work with.

“We’re playing pretty good overall,” Bibby said of the Hawks’ 4-3 preseason record, “but we still have lapses here and there. It starts with me; I need to put more pressure on the ball and make things a little tougher on [their] point guard. I think that will wear off on everyone else.”

Hawks coach Mike Woodson would like to see it sooner rather than later, particularly on the defensive end.

“We’re not playing at the level that we finished against the Celtics in the playoffs,” he said of the Hawks’ defensive effort. “Guys that have gone through camp to this point know the intensity that we want to play with, and I’m not getting that right now. So we’ve got some work to do before we head back to Orlando for our opening game.”

NEXT FOR HAWKS

> Who: at Pistons (exhibition)

> When: 7:30 p.m. Thursday

> TV; radio: No TV; 790 AM

[Atlsportfanz]

You almost got to consider playing Orlando the way teams played Shaq early in his career. I'm not suggesting Hack a Shaq but shut down everyone else (or at least hold them under their normal averages), especially Hedo and Lewis and you should have a fighting shot.

Give up 30 and 15 to Howard but don't let the other guys go off on you. Most teams want to double team him so much they just leave all these spot up shooters open and get blown out the building. Just Hope that Horford or ZaZa can play him tough, try to keep him from getting deep position in the paint and lock down on your outside shooters.

[Buzzard]

Trying to stop Howard is like trying to stop Tim Duncan in his prime. It cannot be done. We can foul him and put him on the line to slow him down and that is about the best we can hope for.

They killed us at the 3pt line and that is where we can stop them. 52% from beyond the arc is ridiculous. I do not think they will average that very often against us or any other team for that matter. But when they do, Orlando is just about unbeatable.

We had a chance to tie late in the game. All in all that is a pretty good effort. Especially since we did not play Marvin or Evans.

I think Orlando will surpass everyone but Boston this year in the East. At worse they will be behind Boston and Detroit; but I think they will catch Detroit due to their age/energy advantage. I am not talking just record wise, I expect Orlando to make the EC finals this year...