DWIGHT’S DEFENSE SAVES WIN AGAINST CELTICS

If there was any question as to who should win the NBA’s Defensive Player of the Year award – and really at this point it should be a slam dunk – Dwight Howard delivered a resounding exclamation point Wednesday with a game-saving blocked shot.
Dwight’s two-handed stuff of Boston superstar Paul Pierce at the rim saved an 84-82 victory for the Magic against the Celtics. It also gave the Magic a leg up in the battle for the No. 2 seed in the Eastern Conference and locked up a second consecutive Southeast Division title for the Magic.
Afterward, all anyone could talk about was Dwight’s emphatic, game-saving blocke d shot – his fourth such stuff of the night. And Dwight, much to his credit, predicted the way the play would unfold before Pierce ever went down the lane.
``I told the guys when we came out of the huddle that they are going to give the ball to Paul Pierce. Please block out my man and I’ll try to go and get a big block,’’ Dwight recalled. ``It happened just the way we drew it up and I’m just glad he didn’t get the shot off.’’
The big block was just part of a dazzling night for the Magic’s franchise center. He entered the game averaging just 14 points against the Celtics, but he broke out of a mini-slump against Boston by hitting 11 of his first 14 shots and scoring 24 points.
More importantly, and one of the main reasons why Dwight should be the runaway favorite to win the Defensive Player of the Year award, was the 21 rebounds he gobbled up. Two of those rebounds came in heavy traffic in the final minute when the Magic were clinging to a one-point lead.
Remarkably, it was the eighth time this season that Dwight has registered a game with at least 20 points and 20 rebounds. To put that in perspective, the rest of the league has six combined (one by six different players). And Dwight had his league-leading 56th double-double … by the end of the first quarter, the fourth time he’s accomplished that feat this season.
When asked afterward about his standing in the MVP race, Dwight instead talked of his pursuit of a championship rather than individual awards. And he stressed that his defensive contributions mean more to the Magic’s sparkling 53-18 record than some scoring records.
``Twenty points and 20 rebounds are a lot more valuable than 40 points because a lot of my rebounds are on the defensive end and that way teams don’t get a second chance to score,’’ Dwight said. ``It’s better for me to try and get rebounds than trying to score a lot of points.’’
As for his perceived place in the MVP voting behind LeBron20James, Kobe Bryant and Dwyane Wade, here’s what Dwight said: ``It doesn’t bother me. Like I’ve been stressing, it’s about winning a championship. I’m all about team first and it’s not a cliché. I want to win a championship and it’s not all about MVP or what I can do individually. It’s about winning banners, that’s it.’’
Dwight said the win was important to a Magic team out to show that it’s a legitimate powerhouse in the NBA. The Magic are hungry for national respect, and a tough, hard-nosed win against a champion like Boston can provide that sort of acclaim.
The way Orlando won, by jumping on Boston early and getting gritty defensive stops down the stretch, will give the Magic confidence against the Celtics in the playoffs, Dwight said. And make no mistake about it, the Celtics and the Magic are on course to butt heads again in the playoffs in less than six weeks. And Dwight feels the Magic will be up to the task of beating Boston in a seven-game series.
``We’ll see them again and that’ll be a great test for us,’’ Dwight said. ``We understand that closing out the season strong is big for us. And when we see Boston again we understand now what we have to do to beat the Celtics. We’re not going to beat them playing their game. We have to play our game throughout 48 minutes and throughout a series to beat them.
``We’re confident that we can beat anybody. You’ve got to have that confidence that you can beat anybody. If you don’t believe in yourself nobody else will. We feel we can beat anybody put in front of us when we play our type of basketball.’’