As D.J. Augustin and Michael Carter-Williams watched helplessly from the bench, wearing dapper suits and also wearing fake smiles on their faces, Wes Iwundu went out and led his team to a victory over the much-vaunted, LeBron-led “superteam” of the Lakers. His defense, his bucket-getting ability, his foul-drawing ability (which verged an Hardenesque), and his fun-to-say last name were all crucial in helping the lowly Magic (who maybe aren’t so lowly anymore) take down the metaphorical Goliath. Markelle Fultz will certainly draw more of the headlines with his triple-double, but let not the contributions of Iwundu ever be forgotten.
Not only did Iwundu make LeBron James into bitchmeat, he did it while distracting hair strands were flying in his face the entire game. As a man with long hair that sometimes escapes its restraints while I’m trying to ball out, there’s nothing worse than trying to square up for a jumper while your vision is obscured by hair. The thing is, Iwundu’s hairstyle seems to be a deliberate choice. If he didn’t want it hanging in his face, he would do something else with it. It’s like an Elfrid Payton situation where he’s deliberately handicapping himself with his choice of hairstyle. The only difference is, Iwundu looks pretty cool, while Payton just looked like he was too poor to afford a hat.
Iwundu’s ability to dominate superteams has got me wondering now: what if he had played thirty MPG per game during the Magic’s first-round series against the Raptors last season? Iwundu’s real role was much smaller than that (12 MPG per game, and he only made six buckets the whole series) but maybe he’s the kind of dude who needs a lot of minutes to produce.
Yeah, I’m thinking the Magic blew their chance at a championship by not having a starting backcourt of Fultz and Iwundu.