Dwight Howard leads Orlando Magic over Atlanta Hawks, 88–82: NBA Update
Dwight Howard put up 33 points and grabbed 19 rebounds as the Orlando Magic fired up in the third quarter to record an 88–82 win over the Atlanta Hawks in Game 2 in Orlando on April 19. The Magic had trouble finding the rim on Tuesday, but Dwight Howard went 9-of-12 from the field and 15-of-19 from the line to power Orlando over the Hawks.
After dropping Game 1 at home to the Hawks, the Magic bounced back to tie the first-round play-off series at 1–1, as the games now move to Atlanta.
Howard followed up his monster 46-point and 19 rebound performance in Game 1 with another huge game on Tuesday to spark the cold-shooting Magic to a win in front of a packed arena at the Amway Arena.
Jameer Nelson added 13 points while Hedo Turkoglu chipped in with 10 points and five assists.
Howard looked unstoppable on the offensive end as the Magic repeatedly kept feeding him the ball in the paint, and the 6-11 centre dominated the Hawks. Al Horford committed two fouls in the first two minutes of the game and was restricted to the bench for the rest of the half as Howard took advantage of the smaller Hawks line-up.
Atlanta led 22–16 at the end of the first quarter.
Jamal Crawford made consecutive jumpers in the second quarter to extend the Hawks lead to 32 -22, before the Magic fired off a 12–2 run to knot the game at 34–34. Howard was the main contributor during that run as he poured in 10 points.
Atlanta made a couple of shots and it was up to Howard again to lead the Magic fight-back. He nailed a bank shot, and drew a couple of fouls and made the resulting free-throws to add six straight points for Orlando.
Orlando led 48–42 at the halftime break.
In the third quarter, Josh Smith’s jump-shot cut the Orlando lead to two point with 3:14 minutes left, but Orlando responded with a 10-1 run to stretch their advantage to 11 points going into the final quarter.
Atlanta rallied in the final quarter once again behind Horford and Joe Johnson, but Orlando kept its composure to win the game.
Jamal Crawford scored 25 points, Josh Smith added 17 and Al Horford chipped in with 10 points and 10 rebounds for the Atlanta Hawks in the losing effort.
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