With Deni on the pine, big lead turns to bad beat
A worst-case scenario start to the Wizards' 2020-21 season.
You’re reading DENI DIARY, the weekly dispatch from Deni Avdija’s rookie season by Louis Keene.
“There’s a lot of season left,” Scott Brooks said after Sunday night’s stomach-punch loss, but how much longer will this Wizards head coach be a part of it?
Playing the Orlando Magic for the second night in a row, Washington took a 17-point lead into the fourth quarter before everything went wrong. Orlando rattled off 8 quick points before Brooks could call timeout and reinsert Bradley Beal (29 points on 29 shots). But by then the Magic were cooking, and the rest of the lead was gone by the five minute mark. The 120-113 loss dropped Washington to 0-3 on the season.
The final-period collapse marred a bounce-back performance from Deni Avdija. Avdija was limited by foul trouble the previous night — which Orlando won 130-120 — the victim of a tough whistle, though he still finished perfect from the field (5 points, 3 rebounds, and 2 assists). On Sunday, Deni displayed better defensive discipline, using his height and moving his feet to challenge shots. He’s quickly adapting to the NBA game at both ends.
What you’re seeing on the second half of that clip above is Deni refusing to “die” on the screen, using his size to fight around it and stay attached to the rolling big man, eliminating him as a target for the ballhandler (#20). That’s professional, committed defense.
Avdija also picked up where he left off offensively, hitting his first three and creating an easy dunk for center Thomas Bryant a few possessions later:
Without a resting Russell Westbrook in the lineup, Deni finally got more shots. He finished 4/11 from the field for 9 points, 9 boards, 3 assists and 2 steals (with only 1 turnover and 1 foul). A pair of his drives probably merited whistles; those are free throws he’ll earn with more experience.
Perhaps most promising is something that’s already being taken for granted: Avdija is this team’s starting small forward, a role he seems unlikely to relinquish anytime soon. Despite his team’s 7-point margin of defeat, Deni was a +13 in 36 minutes played.
But a back-and-forth ending saw Troy Brown, Jr., and Davis Bertans close over Avdija and defensive ace Issac Bonga (a team-high +20), and even having taken a three-point lead with 50 seconds left, the Wizards couldn’t close it out. After the game, Brooks said Avdija didn’t close because he’d played almost the entire second half, and he liked how Brown (12 points on 7 shots) was playing.
The back-to-back losses underscored a familiar theme for Brooks’ bunch in recent years: their abysmal defense. The Magic are a solid team, to be sure, but hardly a powerhouse; Washington gave up 250 points to them in less than 36 hours. Yes, the Wiz are undermanned with second-year forward Rui Hachimura and Westbrook sitting. They are playing a lot of young guys and a lot of small guys a lot of minutes. It’s possible that no coach would be able to train this group to defend at a league-average level.
But at a certain point, when you’ve lost your first two games, including to the same team the day prior, a team has to show some fight and bring home the third on their home floor. It’s not always glib to talk about a team’s character, or their will to win, or their ability to focus. You don’t need the 17-point leads to turn into 30-point wins — a 1-point win would have sufficed here. Late-game lineup decisions by Brooks, including his decision not to bring Beal in to start the fourth, certainly played a part in the Wiz not escaping with the bare minimum here.
The Wizards’ next two are against the (cellar-dwelling) Chicago Bulls.
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