Orlando Magic: Why is their defense struggling right now?

The Orlando Magic may have kicked it up a gear offensively, but since the All-Star break they have forgotten how to defend. Why has this happened?

An eight-game stretch can pass by awful quick in the NBA, and yet it can still feel like a long time if a team is struggling. The Orlando Magic right now aren’t in a terrible place, they still occupy the final playoff seed in the East, but they have returned from the All-Star break playing the opposite way from what led them to a playoff spot in the first place.

How has this happened? Why have an outfit that is known for playing hard under head coach Steve Clifford, who had to exit Friday night’s win over the Minnesota Timberwolves with dehydration, become so lackluster in such a short space of time? Can we figure out why exactly they rank 29th (118.1) in this area since their return to regular season action?

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There are a couple of reasons why this may have happened, and it starts with the personnel that are missing already through injury. Jonathan Isaac may not play again this season, and although he has been gone since the turn of the year, there was always going to be a period where his absence was felt even more strongly.

Isaac looks like he could be a Defensive Player of the Year candidate one day, and given that he is only in his third season in the league, that is the kind of talent that you want to have on the court and build around on that end. So he is a miss. So too is Al-Farouq Aminu, who has been out of action since November 29th and likely won’t suit up again this year.

These are two guys who were always going to make a difference on that end, even if the Magic struggled to fit Aminu in initially. Things were improving before he went down, and his presence off the bench with the second unit is missed as well. This doesn’t explain everything though, as the Magic have cratered from how they were already playing even without both these guys.

Another problem is the regression of center Nikola Vucevic. The organization’s first All-Star since Dwight Howard last season, the four-year, $100 million deal he signed during the offseason already looks like a potentially troubling one for the Magic. He’s not as good as he was last year, particularly defensively where he had worked himself into being a serviceable player on that end.

The Magic have a rating of 110 when Vucevic is on the court, which may be better than their current eight-game stretch, but is the worst mark he has posted personally in his career so far. So much of what this team does revolves around Vucevic’s brilliant offensive game, and the fact he had become passable on the other end.

But that isn’t working as well this season, having been one of the foundational reasons they made the playoffs last year. Aaron Gordon, this team’s best two-way player, may be about to put the Magic on his back, but in recent games he has traded some of his excellent defending in for a higher scoring output.

This leads us to the real reason the Orlando Magic are not playing close to elite defensive basketball at the moment. They don’t have to. As unbelievable as the following statement is, the Magic actually rank first in offensive efficiency (117.4) since the All-Star break. They have gone 4-4 during this time.

Somehow they have been shooting the lights out when the opposite was true before the break. Players are hitting from all angles, and this thankfully includes Terrence Ross, who has rediscovered a shooting stroke that had been missing for a worrying amount of time.

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In his last 10 games he is averaging 20.8 points per contest, and 46.6 percent of his shots from deep (to go with 46.8 from the floor, a great combination). With performances like this from guys off the bench, it is no wonder the Magic have led the scoring charts. An entertaining shootout against the Brooklyn Nets recently typified this new way they’re playing.

The Magic won that game 115-113, but the Nets shot the lights out. So the Magic responded by simply making more shots at big moments. This is an aspect of their game that hasn’t really existed before now, and which is a welcome sight. The team has spent so long protecting the basket because they knew they didn’t have the capability to outscore most opponents.

Now all of a sudden they can, so getting up and down and attacking opponents has meant the basket is less guarded than before. Guys like Ross are coming in and it is giving his teammates a lift to know that he will be able to provide scoring right away. Similar to how they ended last season, when they made the playoffs.

Will they be able to find more of a balance so that the defensive play is more closely aligned to their scoring? It remains to be seen, but if the Orlando Magic could do that, then they would have a shot at claiming the seventh seed for the postseason. Time is running out though, and even if the defense remains this poor, it has been nice to see them transition to scoring more baskets.