Magic players, coaches discuss effort, establish teammate roles
Magic to face Nets for the third time this season,
Magic players and coaches held a team meeting before Thursday’s practice to address several issues such as effort, accountability and defining roles.
After Wednesday night’s lackluster loss to the San Antonio Spurs, center NikVucevicandshootingguardJ.J. Redick said themeetingwas productive.
“I’m certainly going to have some conversations with a few of the guys over the next couple of days,” Redick said. “Coach [Jacque Vaughn] did a nice job this morning in our meeting trying to get everybody on the same page.
“The goal, ultimately, is winning and what can we do to get each other to play better. For us, it was good.”
Vucevic said the issues weren’t so much about the loss to the Spurs
“but the way we played. … We talked about people’s roles on the team. [Vaughn] fixed a lot of stuff.”
Frustrated veterans Arron Afflalo and Glen Davis likely triggered the meeting after speaking publicly following the loss to the Spurs, especially about teammates learning their roles.
“I think we still need to find out who’s our guys and who’s not our guys,” Davis said. “Then everybody can kind of move on. At the same time, we need to grow. We need to find out who’s our energy guy, who’s our vocal guy.
“At times like this, we really need to bite down and check each other … and see what we can all do to make this team better.”
Redick said that despite thepreseasonand14regularseason games, the Magic — who revamped their team after the Dwight Howard trade — are still finding their footing.
“Yes, we are still trying to figure things out, and it is a work in progress,” Redick said. “The goal is to get better every day, and we took a step back, and that’s just unacceptable because we can’t have steps back.
“Forme, it starts withpersonal accountability. When you lose a game and you played poor you wonder, ‘WhatcouldIhavedonebetter?’ Regardless of who the opponent was, that’s irrelevant. We got our butts kicked.”
After Thursday’s practice, Vaughn refused to acknowledge that a meeting took place.
“We talked about Brooklyn, how we need to play … nothing monumental,” he said.
Vaughn added earlier, though, that he welcomed players holding each other accountable.
“I wasn’t in the locker room, so I don’t know what was said [by Afflalo and Da- vis]. So I really can’t comment on that aspect of it,” Vaughn said. “But I’ve said from Day One that this is about us, coaches and players included. There’s ownership across the board. I’ve always encouraged that.”
TheMagic are 5-9andare in the midst of a daunting stretch of their schedule. They’ve lost their last two to the Celtics and Spurs. They face the Nets tonight before tipping off a five-game West swingagainst theLakersand Howard on Sunday.
“We want to win and that’s the goal,” Redick said. “Butasubsidiarygoalistodo it the right way, regardless of the outcome, because you can’t always control the results. You can control your approach and your effort. That was a part of what was addressed in our meeting today — taking care of what you can control.”