Discuss

I think Orlando wins game one, but the Lake Show will take it in 6 games.

Magic take this series in 5 games. They'll split in LA, then take three straight at home. Kobe pulls a LeBron at the end...

magic in 5. Gasol has a tough match up having to guard lewis and his long range shooting. Flip gasol to Howard and he will get dominated. Pietrus will do a good job guarding Kobe. Lakers havnt impressed me through these playoffs. Denver should of had game 1, and mayb possibly even game 3.

Magic have to win game one to take away the Phil advantage... remember his teams are 43-0 when they win game one of a playoff series.

The Lakers lost game one of the finals to both the Pistons and Celtics and the rest is history..

Go Lakers, and Jackson please stop playing mind games w/ Bynum. You're kinda going to need him for this series . . .

edited to add;

For prediction Lakers in 6 or 7. Unfortunately, the match-up advantages the Magic had against the Cavs are going to look very Piston-eque IMO this series.

The game was over about 5 minutes into the third and the series might be over now that the Phil has won game one...( I stand corrected as Phil is now 43-0 when his teams take game one... 24-0 with the Bulls and 19-0 with the Lakers).

Kobe outscored the Magic 18 to 15 in the 3rd... and just to make sure there was no Magic comeback, Phil kept Kobe and the starters in until less than two minutes left in the game with 20+ point lead. What if JJ Redick had tackled Kobe and broke his shooting hand in the last 5 mins of garbage time??????

Magic have three days to find their shot, so I am not predicting sweep like some of the Laker fans I heard on the radio yesterday, but the Magic will have to shoot better than 30% if they expect win any games in this series. The Magic starters were 11-46 shooting...

I thought the Magic really lost their flow when they brought Nelson in. The blowout might help him find his game and timing. I was waiting for Will Bynum to pick his pocket when he brought the ball up.

Nail on the head.

Once again coach Van Dummy finds a way to screw his own team by ruining the chemistry and momentum they had built getting to the Finals by foolishly throwing a guy into the mix that has been out most of the year and WAITING UNTIL THE NBA FINALS TO DO IT.

This guy never ceases to amaze me in the ways he finds to ruin his own chances. Nelson should be on the roster, but on the bench for this series Finals or not.

I wasn't opposed to him playing, but I figured that SVG would run Nelson out there for a couple of 5-7 minute stints to see if he could spark the team and spell Rafer. He acutally had like 3 nice assists when he came into the game and broke down the D so it was sort of working. I flipped to the wings game and flipped back a few minutes later, and groaned when I saw that he was still in the game.

Sure enough SVG had him out there way too long (23 mins) and he finished the game with 4 assists and 6 points (I watched him dish 3 assists and score 2 points in like his first 3 mins of play). I'm not all that high on Rafer, but he should be playing more than the 25 mins he got just because he is who was playing their whole playoff run.