The NBA playoffs continue on Tuesday night with several Game 5s on tap. The Orlando Magic will travel to take on the Indiana Pacers with a start time of 7 p.m. EST and it will be televised nationally on NBA.tv. The spread has Indiana favored by 10.5 points with the total sitting at 179 points. The Pacers currently hold a 3-1 series lead and are looking to eliminate the Magic from playoff contention with a win here tonight.
Free Analysis: The Indiana Pacers haven't advanced past the first round of the NBA Playoffs since the 2005 season. David West is a big reason the team is looking to get over that hump as he is having a major series. West had 26 points and 12 rebounds in the Game 4 win. He's averaging 17 points and 10 rebounds per game in the series. Orlando would probably prefer to slow him down, but Ryan Anderson hasn't been able to keep up with him. Having center Dwight Howard on the floor might have changed things in this series for the Magic, but playing without him has obviously caused them to be poor defensively. Indiana's defense wasn't exactly the best in the last game as Orlando scored 28 points in the fourth quarter, nearly coming back to tie the game. Sporting a 23-10 record during the regular season at home, the Pacers were one of the best teams in the league in their own arena. However, they did drop the opening game of this series as the Magic picked up a low-scoring win at 81-77. Pacers forward Danny Granger is expected to play despite tweaking his knee. Glen Davis has been a pretty big bright spot for the Magic so far, averaging 20 points per game in the series. He's also collected more than 9 rebounds per game and shot nearly 46 percent from the floor. However, he's really the only Magic player that has been shooting the ball well as the team is connecting on just 39 percent from the field and 33 percent from 3-point range in the series. Orlando has been a team that relies a lot of 3-pointers during the regular season while Indiana has been defending it well in the series. The Pacers are a big team and that has proven to have kept the Magic off track. That will and should continue tonight as the Magic will probably mail it in and head for next year.
Free Pick: Lots of points here, even with a team at home, but they are in a closeout game in the playoffs. The easiest thing to say about the game is Orlando is going to have to show up. If they don't show up, then they will get run. However, Stan Van Gundy's team could still have some fight in them. It's obvious the team and Howard might be headed in different directions during the offseason and that could start as early as tonight. Orlando will probably hang around for the first couple of quarters but I expect them to get beat up and pushed aside by the Pacers. They've won by an average of 13 points in their wins during the series and they should win by that margin again tonight.
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