And we’re back. Bubble basketball got underway for the Magic today, with an important matchup against the Nets of Brooklyn — their primary foe for the seventh seed — the opening game on the schedule.
The first few minutes of returned Magic basketball were, to put it kindly, pretty rusty. They had trouble stopping the Nets from getting wherever they wanted, with the guards failing to restrict the point of attack on the perimeter and Orlando’s drop coverage struggling to meaningfully contest the ensuing shots in the paint. Brooklyn hit 7 of their first 9 from the field, racing out to a 16-8 lead and forcing the first Clifford-called timeout of the restart.