The Orlando Magic should be doing way better than they are in the NBA Bubble. Every game is like a home game for them. Everyone knows about the advantages that the Nuggets have when playing at home, but the Magic have those same sorts of advantages. They know how to deal with playing at sea level every game. They know how to deal with the fact that there’s a downpour at 2 PM every afternoon. These other teams, they aren’t accustomed to those things. So why do they keep losing, despite their inherent advantage?
A deep and deliberate analysis of the situation is that it’s because Markelle Fultz isn’t getting enough assists. Note: “deep and deliberate analysis” in this case means “I looked at boxscores for five seconds”. Before this game, he had three dimes in each of the four games Orlando has played. He kind of ruined the symmetry by getting 10, but it was the good kind of ruining. Because you definitely want him to be distributing the ball, and three dishes per game is not going to cut it. Who else is going to pass the ball on that team? D.J. Augustin? The guy who averages the most dribbles per possession in the whole league? Don’t make me LOL.
The Magic, with Fultz pretty much leading the way (Vucevic doesn’t count for the purposes of this description for narrative-based reasons), were looking really good here against the Celtics despite missing some key pieces. It didn’t result in a win, but it almost did, and I still absolutely got my fill of enraged Celtics-fan comments on social media, which is all that really matters in the end.