Do You Believe in Magic?

Charlie Klein

Throughout the entire Eastern Conference Finals, the Orlando Magic were out to prove a point. That point being that they were the better team and with their 103-90 win over the Cleveland Cavaliers last night at AmWay Arena in Orlando.

The Orlando Magic have ended the second longest drought between NBA Finals in league history. It was 14 years ago that a Magic team led by Shaquille O'Neal and Penny Hardaway won the Eastern Conference but then lost to the Houston Rockets. What makes their success that remarkable is that the Magic are six years removed from having the worst record in the league. Brian Schmitz of the Orlando Sentinel said that the Magic were, "back from the basketball dead."

For the Cleveland Cavaliers, it is an unfitting end of the season that no one saw coming. The Cavaliers had the NBA's best record, NBA MVP LeBron James, and NBA Coach of the Year Mike Brown. The people in Cleveland, as well as pretty much everywhere else, believed that finally this would be the year that would end the city's 45 year championship drought. What proved to be this team's undoing was the fact that they only had one star player. James could not carry them throughout a seven game series in which the rest of the team was exposed for what they really were, role players. It seems crazy now to think that a team with Wally Szerbiak, Anderson Varejao, Ben Wallace, Boobie Gibson, and Delonte West would be thought of as the team to beat in the Eastern Conference. All of those players are only in the NBA because they do one thing really well, and if they were not doing that, they would not be in the NBA. Against weaker opponents in the Eastern Conference the Cavaliers were made to look like world beaters, but when they came up against an actual team, they had no chance.

The Cavaliers could take a lesson from the book of the Magic. Build a team around three main players, not just one. The Magic made an awfully prescient decision by choosing Dwight Howard over Emeka Okafor in the 2004 NBA Draft. They also gave a controversial contract to Rashard Lewis. People wondered why they were willing to give him a big contract when he had no playoff experience. Hedo Turkoglu, who was brought in 2004, won the NBA Most Improved Player award last season and look at him now. The Magic also made a great draft choice in selecting Mikael Pietrus from France. Pietrus in this Eastern Conference Finals outscored the entire Cavaliers bench. The Magic even lost their All-Star point guard Jameer Nelson (another fine draft pick) and were able to overcome it by the trade for Rafer Alston in addition to the fine play of Courtney Lee, their 2008 first round selection. The Magic present difficult matchups for opponents. Lewis and Turkoglu are both 6'10'' and are knock down shooters. Dwight Howard is simply a monster in the middle who has finally learned how to use his size to his advantage.

The 2008-2009 Cleveland Cavaliers could go down as one of the biggest farces in NBA history. I myself always wondered how they were as good as they had been playing. I was one of the people who believed that the Cavaliers would win this series in five games, and we were all so wrong. The city of Cleveland will have to wait another year for its first championship in basketball, while the city of Orlando can look forward to adding its first championship versus the Los Angeles Lakers.