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Turkoglu leads as Magic dispatch Wizards

Jan 7, 2009 - 4:59 AM By Zach Chalifour PA SportsTicker Contributing Writer

ORLANDO, Florida (Ticker) -- Hedo Turkoglu scored 22 points as the Orlando Magic got back in the win column Tuesday night with an 89-80 win over the Washington Wizards.

Dwight Howard recorded his league-leading 25th double-double of the season with 15 points and 16 rebounds and Jameer Nelson poured in 14 points to help the Magic move to a perfect 3-0 against the Wizards this season.

The Magic shot 41 percent (31-for-75) from the field - a below-average offensive performance by the team's standard, but put forth a strong defensive effort.

"We missed a lot of opportunities on offense, turned it over 15 times, but luckily we managed to win it with defense and rebounding," Magic coach Stan Van Gundy said.

Washington started strong, hitting four consecutive jump shots in the opening minutes of the contest, but the Magic matched the visitors shot-for-shot.

If not for their performance in the second quarter, the Wizards may have been able to upset one of the league's best teams for the second time in as many games, following their 80-77 upset of the Cleveland Cavaliers on Sunday.

But Washington shot a paltry 11 percent (2-for-19) in the second period, scoring just six points while committing eight turnovers - its worst single-quarter performance of the season.

"When you have any single quarter like that - just six points - you're not going to win many games in this league. We put ourselves in a grave in the second quarter," Wizards interim coach Ed Tapscott said.

The Magic finally established a 46-30 halftime lead as a result, and they had little trouble holding on until a late scare in the final minutes of the game.

Caron Butler led Washington's second-half push with 21 third-quarter points, helping the visitors cut the Magic lead to seven points going into the fourth quarter.

"We had to survive an unbelievable second half by Caron," Van Gundy said. "I thought we did a good job defending him, but he just hit a ton of shots."

Magic rookie Courtney Lee, who made the first start of his career, was charged with the responsibility of guarding Butler for most of the game. Butler was held scoreless in the second half.

"Nothing changed on defense in the second half, Caron was just elevating over us and hitting his shots. He's a tremendous player," Lee said.

The Wizards finally got it to within three on Butler's jumper with 1:22 remaining in the game, but Nelson's layup and two free throws by Howard pushed the lead back to seven, icing the win with 33 seconds to play.

"We wanted to stay aggressive on defense and it gave us a chance to win even if we didn't hit our shots," said Nelson, who shot just 5-of-17.

Butler finished with 29 points and Antawn Jamison finished with 13 as the only Washington players to reach double figures in scoring.