Stan Van Gundy, Orlando Magic and the NBA Championship: NBA Feature (Part-2)
Engage Gilbert Arenas
Ex-Washington Wizards shooting guard Gilbert Arenas is one of the biggest concerns for Orlando Magic at the moment. The franchise spent a lot of money to acquire the dynamic scorer, however he failed to live to the expectations
in the last season with the Magic.
Coming into Orlando Magic in the middle of the 2010-2011 season, the 29-year-old Gilbert Arenas’ average dropped down to 8.0 points and 3.2 assists per game from an average of more than 17 points and six assists when he was playing
for Washington Wizards.
The dramatic downfall in Arenas’ performance was mainly because of the substantial decrease in his playing minutes on the court. There is no point for a player like Arenas, who is slated to make 21 million dollars in the next season,
to sit on the bench most of the time.
Stan Van Gundy needs to give Gilbert Arenas more minutes. Everybody knows Gilbert is a prolific scorer and he also helps his teammates in freeing up a number of opportunities. That is why Orlando Magic hired him in the first place.
Now it’s up to Stan Van Gundy to benefit from Gilbert Arenas’ extraordinary talent. Having Arenas on the court for the maximum time will not only help Orlando Magic on the front court, a lot of pressure will also be removed from
the best man of the team, Dwight Howard, who was seen lifting the burden of both the ends in the last season.
Reduce Dwight Howard’s workload
One man Orlando Magic have been heavily relying on and will continue to do so in future, to accomplish their ultimate Championship goal is their star centre Dwight Howard. Since the big man came into the league, the Orlando Magic
became a formidable threat for every opposition. The size, agility and strength of Howard is what makes him the most dangerous players in the league.
In the last season, the burly centre had his best performance with an average of 22.9 and 14.1 rebounds per game. As a result of his grand influence on the defence yet again, Howard was named the Best Defensive Player of the Year
for the third successive time.
However, so dependant have been the Magic on Howard in the last few years, that he rarely gets time on the bench and when he does, it is not much. All this results in the fact, that Howard despite being super fit is exhausted when
the games reach their clutch moments.
Stan Van Gundy needs to save Howard’s energy for last in order to ensure that Orlando Magic’s ace player is there to win the games down the stretch. For this purpose, engaging Gilbert Arenas for more minutes, who received only
21 minutes of playing time in the last season and finding a reasonable big on the D, will help Dwight Howard to take some rest and keep the momentum going throughout the game.
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