Grant Hill is out of the cast, but left ankle injuries
continue to irritate Orlando
Opponent File
Orlando Magic
The Magic play in the TD Waterhouse Center
in Orlando, Florida. Their 2001 - 2002 record was 44 - 38 (third in the
Atlantic). Here's the Orlando
Magic Roster.
Local Paper:
Orlando
Sentinel | Magic
Team Pages:
CNNSI.com
| Magic
ESPN.com
| Magic
NBA.com | Magic
The
Sporting News | Magic
Sportsline.com
| Magic
Head Coach:
Glenn "Doc" Rivers.
2002 Draft:
Ryan Humphrey, PF (Notre Dame), selected at #19. Mario Kasun, C (Opel
Skyliners, Germany), selected at #41.
New Players:
Shawn Kemp, F (Portland, waivers). Olumide Oyedeji,
C (Seattle, Free Agency). Jacque Vaughn, G (Atlanta, Free Agency).
Season Slogan: "McGrady and Hill together forever!"
Record vs. Nets: 0 - 0
Other Opponent Files
Projected Atlantic Division Standing:
Chris Carrino: 2
Champagne: 3
Frank DiGraci: 5
Ian Eagle: 3
Joe Netsfan: 2
Cast Aside
Grant Hill is back. They're still treating him tenderly down in Orlando – he's averaging 28.5 mpg this year, which is about 10 minutes less than his career average – but his notoriously balky left ankle appears to be healed.
Now they've got other left ankle problems. Tracy McGrady sprained his on Monday against the Boston Celtics and did not play on Wednesday against the Knicks. He is expected to play tonight, however, when the Wizards visit them in Orlando. Mike Miller also has a left ankle prone to injury, and he turned it in Wednesday's game against New York. "It's going to be a long season" remarked Miller.
It's true. Orlando can rarely put a pain-free team on the court. Horace Grant is just coming back from offseason arthroscopic surgery on his left knee that took longer than expected to heal. Hill and McGrady, a tandem Orlando and Doc Rivers hope will one day be as memorable as Jordan/Pippin, can't quite get in injury-free sync for a good winning run.
As for the Nets...did they get their one and only run last season? Or are Mutombo's, Kittles' and Childs' injuries mere early season blips, soon to be forgotton? Let's take a look at the Nets own Pain Game:
Dikembe Mutombo - Deke had surgery to repair a torn ligament in his right wrist yesterday. He will spend 8 weeks in a cast before he can start rehabilitation. The Nets are looking at a possible 4 months without him. That's a late March return for a center who was supposed to star for them, the linchpin to the Nets' hardened defensive make-up. To Champagne's mind, comparison's to Todd MacCulloch's foot injury last season do not apply. Mutombo will be gone for much longer, and without the benefit of having integrated fully into the Nets' Princeton offense. The learning process may start over for Dikembe, just when they need him fully in gear. The number 1 seed in the Eastern Conference is definitely looking hazy. Jason Collins has had the next best opportunity of his career arrive a bit early, thanks to an Eric Piatkowski no-call foul on his big Zairian mentor. We shall see what he will do with it. The Nets now have two sophmore starters.
Kerry Kittles - Sprained his left knee in Portland. Thank goodness it wasn't his repaired and re-repaired right knee, but it will still take Kittles at least 2 weeks to return. Kittles was having a quiet but fairly decent season-opening, and it looked to my eyes like he was beginning to peak and grow just recently. It's too bad. But the Nets have Lucious "Double Duty" Harris, second only to Aaron Williams in winning the "hardest working bench player in New Jersey" tag. Harris has been holding Chris Child's place at the back-up point, inserted in critical situations that the coaching staff has no confidence that Anthony Johnson can handle, and has continued shooting about as hot as he did last season. We thought we traded for an established Sixth Man of the Year in Rodney Rogers, but we've been harboring one all along in Lucious.
Chris Childs - The Duke Diet and Fitness Center has shrunk his waistline and, according to Childs, virtually saved his soul (he claims the time spent alone there has helped him rededicate himself to the game). But it did not make his his right achilles tendinitis disappear. He's off the injury list and reportedly practicing with the team, but he still has two weeks of conditioning and healing fully before we'll see Childs step back into a Nets uniform and play. He's a vet, so do we assume he can slip right into the Nets' system? We couldn't with Dikembe.
The Make-Do Meeting - Patched-up, in pain, this isn't the hot Magic/Nets match-up fans on both sides have been craving. In addition, the Magic will most likely be exhausted – they fly in after a night spent trying to contain Jordan and Stackhouse (while the Nets will be very well rested). But this game will certainly have it's thrills – two heady coaches will be asked to make tough adjustments and plug leaks on the fly all night, I expect. Rotating to the man behind the arc will be a point of emphasis for our Nets – with Garrity, McGrady, Hill, Armstrong and Miller, this team can nail threes in bunches. Defending the three has been a NJ weakness. The Nets will need renewed power and confidence from Kenyon Martin, a continued upward curve in performance from Rodney Rogers, smarts from Collins and aggression from Jefferson – Kidd will no doubt be attacking Armstrong relentlessly too – for them to take a win from an Atlantic Division team that's right on their heels in the standings.
See You in Hell, Dolans: Games lost to the Cablevision/YES Mess reaches 17. Want to do something about this? Click here.
- Champagne
Orlando Magic Cheat Sheet
The Story From Orlando: Jerry Brewer (Orlando Sentinal) has the story of the Magic's McGrady-less win over the Knicks, and their ankle and knee woes this season.
Pain Game: Steven Hunter, C-F (knee, on injured reserve list). Olumide Oyedeji, C (low back strain, placed on injured list to make room for Horace Grant, back from offseason arthroscopic surgery on his left knee).
Controversy: Shawn Kemp's weight remains scandalous. He's listed at 280, the heaviest on the Magic roster. Kemp is a forward, mind you, not a center. Bad signing, even considering how cheap he came? (Kemp effectively ripped up his original gigantic contract this summer in order to get signed by a halfway sane team and restart his career. He's off the White Lady too). In the future, Grant Hill's signing could also loom as one of the Magic's worst moves, as he has had his ankle surgically repaired 3 times in 19 months and has only played 18 games for Orlando in 2 seasons. No other controversies in the Kingdom of note.
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