The Magic follow up their one-point loss in Boston with a flop against the lowly Nets in a 121-111 defeat.
BROOKLYN — For the past few weeks, the Orlando Magic have focused on protecting the paint.
They seemed to be making progress. Until Saturday.
The lowly Brooklyn Nets, who have the NBA’s worst record, scored inside at will and beat the Magic 121-111 at the Barclays Center.
The Nets tallied a whopping 72 points in the paint.
“We just weren’t guarding oneon-one,” Magic forward Aaron Gordon said.
“We were just getting blown by. That’s what defense starts with. It starts with one-on-one coverage, and it wasn’t working for us.”
An inability to stop dribble drives has hurt the Magic all season long, and it caused problems again Saturday night.
“We haven’t been a great containment team,” coach Frank Vogel said.
“We’ve shown improvement, but it certainly wasn’t there tonight.” The bench failed, too. The Nets’ reserves outscored the Magic’s reserves 72-16.
The game turned at the beginning of the fourth quarter while starter Terrence Ross played alongside reserves D.J. Augustin, Jodie
Meeks, Mario Hezonja and Bismack Biyombo.
The Nets’ quintet of Archie Goodwin, Isaiah Whitehead, Spencer Dinwiddie, Trevor Booker and Justin Hamilton scored 11 consecutive points to take a 100-89 lead. The Magic never recovered. Vogel subbed in point guard Elfrid Payton for Meeks, but the Magic never cut the Nets’ lead below eight points.
“It was an overall energy, a youthful energy,” Nets coach Kenny Atkinson said.
The Magic lacked the same energy that they showed less than 24 hours earlier during a deflating 117-116 loss to the Boston Celtics. A storm in Boston delayed the Magic’s departure from Logan International Airport into early Saturday morning while crews de-iced the Magic’s chartered jet. The plane arrived late at Newark Liberty International Airport, and coaches and players reached their Manhattan hotel around 3:15 a.m., Vogel said. Orlando players looked flatfooted after they raced out to a 15-5 lead.
“I think we was just a little step slow today,” Payton said. “They were really driving the paint: just hard drive after hard drive, driveand-kick, drive-and-kick until they got something they liked.”
The Nets (17-59) launched a bunch of 3-pointers, and they opened driving lanes when center Brook Lopez stepped out beyond the 3-point line. They followed that formula again and again. Lopez scored a game-high 30 points. Booker added 23 points.
It didn’t matter that Payton notched his fifth tripledouble since March 6, scoring 20 points, collecting 11 rebounds and dished out 11 assists. Center Nikola Vucevic added a team-best 27 points, while Gordon contributed 22 points and a game-high 15 rebounds.
The Magic (27-50) just didn’t defend. And their bench struggled. Orlando was outscored by 17 points when Augustin and Meeks were on the floor, by 20 points when Biyombo played and by 23 points when Hezonja was on the court.
“It was fun to watch, honestly,” Lopez said.
And the Magic followed their strong efforts against the Oklahoma City Thunder on Wednesday and Celtics on Friday with a defensive stinker. “It’s very frustrating,” Gordon said.
Game recap
MAGIC MVP: Gordon played solidly overall, and he made four of his seven shots from 3-point range. His energy wasn’t in doubt.
NETS MVP: Booker led the Nets’ reserves. He made 11 of his 12 shot attempts and corralled eight rebounds. “That must have been Book’s best game of the year,” Nets point guard Jeremy Lin said. “He was incredible.” TURNING POINT: The score was tied 89-89 at the start of the fourth quarter, but Booker scored six points while Dinwiddie added five more. Suddenly, Brooklyn led 100-89. “Our guys were playing hard,” Meeks said. “We just couldn’t seem to get a bucket during that stretch. We were playing