vs. 
Hawks (15-6, 10-2 home) vs. Magic (9-15, 7-9 road)
Everything you need to know:
TV: SportSouth
Radio: 92.9 “The Game” FM
Time: 7:30 EST
Location: Philips Arena
The Atlanta Hawks will meet the Orlando Magic tonight in Philips Arena for the first game of a back-to-back in which the Hawks will turnaround and play the Magic in their neck of the woods tomorrow night in Orlando.
At the start of this season, I expect the Magic to be the worst team in the Southeast Division, but thanks to the Charlotte Hornets putrid start that hasn’t been the case. The Magic are getting better.
This current crop of Magic players general manager Rob Hennigan has concocted is an intriguing one, and one I definitely like a couple seasons from now. Sure, the Magic are 26th in offensive efficiency, but that stat doesn’t tell the whole story for this group.
Tobias Harris, Evan Fournier and Channing Frye, who lead the team in minutes, are all shooting above 40 percent from deep. Yes, Elfrid Payton is an unfathomably bad shooter, but the guys Hennigan is surrounding him with can fill it up when necessary. (Yes, even Aaron Gordon, the Magic’s lottery pick from this summer, was shooting 59 percent from the field before his foot injury.) The bigger issue seems to be how this crop plays with one another.
According to 82games.com, the Payton-Fournier-Harris-Frye-Vucevic starting unit has a plus/minus of -40 thus far. That’s a serious problem. But, that’s also a unit that lacks of a true rim protector and above-average defense on the wings. Not having Oladipo and/or Gordon mesh and getting major minutes with the starting core leads to these kinds of struggles.
The Hawks should look to exploit the Magic’s weak interior defense and vulnerability on the outside when Harris, Fournier and Frye are on the floor. Paul Milsap poses major match-up problems for Frye, so not having Gordon available to hound the league-leader in steals is going to be an issue for Jacque Vaughn‘s bunch.
Kyle Korver, who leads the league in 3s at the moment, and DeMarre Carroll should feast on the Magic’s wings. On the flip side, I’m interested to see how Harris deals with DeMarre chasing him around for 30-plus minutes tonight. He’s going to have to have a big night for the Magic to have a chance.
Another match-up to watch out for is how Jeff Teague deals with combination of Payton and Oladipo guarding him for the majority of the night. If Teague can get past the two pesky on-ball defenders things will get easier in the lane against Vucevic and Frye.
Prediction: Hawks cover and win handily.
