Magic complete rare sweep over Heat, and more takeaways!

While the Orlando Magic nearly blew another large lead, they outlasted the Miami Heat once again, this time inside Kia Center. The Magic’s 121-117 win moves a full game up on the East standings against their Florida foe, where they stand alone as the No. 5 seed.

What were a few of our takeaways?! Let’s examine!

Orlando escaped despite another late comeback from opponent:

Playing their third game in four nights, the Orlando Magic came out guns ablazin’. They had their best first quarter of the season, scoring a season-high 41 points against a soft Heat defense on 16-of-23 shooting — including 20 points (10-13 FG) coming inside the paint alone.

They were easily the more physically dominant team. Orlando was stifling the Heat offense while capitalizing on easy looks and pushing the envelope whenever the situation required offensively. Ultimately, the Magic scored 71 first-half points, tied for their third-most in a first half this season.

Yet, we saw another large lead — 22 points, to be exact — vanquish because of poor decision-making and even worse shooting. Orlando nearly doubled the Heat in turnovers (19-10) and shot just 37.2 percent in the final quarter.

The Magic escaped, but it was a far-from-pretty final five minutes after the first ~42 were largely uncompetitive. Surviving these large blown leads isn’t sustainable long-term.

The Jamal Cain revenge game, like everyone expected:

We could talk about Paolo Banchero’s 27 points or Desmond Bane’s 21, but I want to shed light on Jamal Cain.

Orlando Magic forward Jett Howard was a late scratch due to illness, opening up an opportunity for Cain to get some burn … against his old team, where he spent two seasons.

And the fourth-year wing had his best game of the season.

In 19 minutes off the bench, Cain tallied a season-high 12 points on 5-of-8 shooting, including 2-of-4 from 3-point range. He had seven rebounds while meeting Jaime Jaquez Jr. at the rim in the third quarter.

His impact was present and, frankly, rather unexpected, given the role that the two-way wing has possessed for most of the season.

Magic now complete rare sweep:

As we discussed above, the final score may have been closer than how it felt, but the Orlando Magic completed a unique season sweep in their biggest game of the season.

Orlando entered having won four straight and six of its last eight against Miami. Now, it can add another W to the ledger, completing a rare five-game series sweep over the Heat.

The last time the two teams played five times in a single season was 1993-94, with the Magic taking three of those five meetings. This four-point victory also marks the first time they have swept the season series since 2007-08, when the Heat won 15 games (compared to the Magic’s 52).

Winners of seven-straight, Orlando improves to 38-28 and is now two games up on Miami in the loss column (one game total). It was a huge win with roughly four weeks left in the season.

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