Courtney Lee Helps Magic Topple T-Wolves

The Magic bounced back after a subpar performance against the Celtics to defeat the Timberwolves 100-89 Wednesday night.  Dwight Howard, Rashard Lewis and Hedo Turkoglu combined for 68 points and Orlando, as a whole, shot well, knocking down 57% of their field goals.

Yet Orlando's three biggest names certainly weren't the biggest thing in Orlando on this particular night, instead it was rookie shooting guard Courtney Lee who had an impressive 19 points off the bench.  Lee, in recent week's has seen his playing time increase due in large part to the injuries on the Magic roster and the poor play of J.J. Redick.  In the last three games, Lee has played 28, 27 and 34 minutes.  Lee's performance on Wednesday was, no pun intended, simply magical.  He went 8-10 and tacked on 3 three pointers.  Add in his three steals, four rebounds and three assists and the rookie easily put on the greatest performance of the evening.  With Courtney Lee performing at this level of play, we can expect to see more and more of him.

Dwight Howard was once again the most dominant force on the court, hauling in 14 rebounds to go along with his 23 points, unfortunately Howard struggled a bit from the line, missing seven free throws, surely images of Shaquille O'Neal haunted those in attendance.  

And while Anthony Johnson had only 2 points in 31 minutes and Redick's 5 point contribution was minimal, the Magic looked much better than the did Monday night as they seemingly took a step towards that "level of play" Stan Van Gundy so often alludes to.

Friday the Magic have a home game against Oklahoma City before going on a 5 game road trip.  The Thunder, lead by the aging Kevin Durant, has only been able to snatch two victories thus far and Orlando will be an unlikely team to get the third one against.  However, with the play of Durant, nothing is out of the question.  Durant has 6 games this season in which he has scored more than 24 points, 3 games in which he's scored 30 or more and he is tenth in the league in scoring (Dwight Howard sits at number 9).  This, however, will be the first time that the Magic get to test Durant's ability as he missed their encounter on the 12th of November, instead it was Jeff Green, who has looked good all season long, that gave Orlando the most difficulty.

Oklahoma City looks to be able to hold their own against the Magic this time around, the Magic will be without two of their starters from the previous encounter, and of course, the Durant-Green combination will have to be dealt with in order for the Magic to emerge from this one victorious, however, if the Magic have nothing else going for them, which is far from true, it's that they have one of the game's best on their roster in Dwight Howard.  Howard put up 30 points, 19 rebounds and had 10 blocks the last time these two teams met, if Howard can't be contained, which has been a difficult thing for even the best defenders, Orlando should take this one with ease.