Oct 11, 2008 | 3:00 PM | Euroleague American Tour - CSKA @ Orlando
by: Paul Miles
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 CSKA v Orlando | photo: CSKABasket.comOrlando Magic Starters 66 - CSKA Moscow 66. Unfortunately for Ettore's Red Army, Orlando brought a couple bench players. Final score, 94:66. But it wasn't the bench, but Dwight Howard that made the difference. 28 points, 10 rebounds and 5 steals in just over a full half of play. And while the Red Army is spinning this as not a rout, it's clear that the defending Euroleague champions were simply outclassed by the Eastern Conference's defending Southeast Division champs. Hit the jump for some more analysis and video of CSKA keeping their chin up after getting beat like the missed curfew. Right from the opening tip-off, CSKA was out of sorts getting into early foul trouble and failing to match-up with Orlando physically. Dwight Howard reigned supreme inside the paint, and CSKA's shooters touch was off all night. At the end of the first quarter the Magic had a 37-19 advantage, and never looked back. For the Red Army, the only scoring threats came from Trajan Langdon's 12 points and Terrence Morris' 16 off the bench. No other member of the Russian team got out of single digit scoring. Orlando outscored the Russians from the free throw line 20 (of 27) to 5 (of 7), and were sharper from the field shooting 35 of 74 (47.3%) to CSKA's 29 of 71 (40.8%). The Russians, almost out of necessity, were stronger on the glass, grabbing 39 rebounds, and keeping the starting front court duo of Hedo Turkgolu and Rashard Lewis to a combined 3 rebounds (all to R-Lew's credit). Stan VanGundy tried very hard to show respect to the Euroleague champs saying: I mean the obvious difference in that game is Dwight Howard. I don’t think they have too many guys like him in the Euroleague. I mean that sincerely, I thought if you take him out of the mix then it’s a lot different game. I mean they didn’t have any chance to stop him. You know I thought he was outstanding, he came with good attitude. Again I think our games came with a real good approach. I think we played very, very hard early. I think we are a little out of gas right now, the ball quit moving and we were standing around. We are very tired. And video of CSKA's reactions to the game: Labels: cska moscow, dwight howard, ettore messina, magic, stan vangundy, terrence morris, trajan langdon
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