Pacers Look to Give Magic a Challenge at Home

The Indiana Pacers have been going back and forth basically this season, now at a 5-5 record. But can they get over the hump having more wins than losses besides making it equal or having less wins than losses? We’ll find out tonight when the Pacers host the Orlando Magic at home.

The Magic are 8-3 heading into the game. But they need to remember this is not the same Pacers team like last season. It’s much more different, and that was Indy always has a better chance of winning games at home.

AccuScore knows that, as they basically are saying that the Pacers have a 50-percent chance to the Magic’s 50. So it’s either a close win, or a close loss. Maybe even a blowout going one way or another. But someone is going to lose.

I really don’t have a prediction for who wins this one. But don’t be surprised if Indy actually wins this. The Magic have been surprised before this season, losing to the Utah Jazz after they made a comeback. Then they also lost to the Toronto Raptors, 110-103. The Raptors game came to a bigger shock.

Orlando is recently coming off a blowout win over the Phoenix Suns, 105-89. They had six players in double-figures. They were just rolling consistently on offense.

“I think everybody was going offensively,” said forward Rashard Lewis, who had all 13 of his points in the first three quarters. “I mean, we did a great job of putting the game away early, move the ball, had a lot of assists, total team effort. Thought we did a great job of playing team basketball.”

The Pacers played solid against the Los Angeles Clippers, continuing to show off their tremendous defensive performance against squads. They held the Clips to 33.3-percent shooting that night in the team’s 107-80 victory.

“We wanted to do it on the defensive end,” Danny Granger said after scoring a game-high 22 points while helping to force Los Angeles’ Eric Gordon into a 5-for-17 performance. “We got it accomplished on that end and shot the ball pretty well. We knew we really needed this one to get back to .500.”

While Granger continues to score offensively and improve defensively, there is no question how much improve Roy Hibbert can put up. He has definitely improved himself this season, averaging 16.5 points and ten rebounds per game compared to last season’s average of about twelve points and five rebounds per game.

Hibbert was dominant in the second quarter of the Clippers game, having 14 points and going seven-of-seven. He was unstoppable.

“I got the feeling that nobody could stop me down there,” Hibbert said. “I just wanted to get to the front of the paint and just get as big as possible and do some damage down there.”

But Hibbert is going to have a big challenge when he faces the league’s best center, Dwight Howard. This is definitely going to be the match-up of the game, no question about it. I see a tough battle.

It’s going to be a good game tonight, no question.

Enjoy it, Pacers’ fans!