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___5-11 (5th SE Div/14th East)_____________________6-11 (3rd ATL div/11th East)
_3-11 vs East / 0-8 road / 3-7 L10)________________5-6 vs East / 4-4 home / 5-5 L10



Well hey, let's start with some good news. John Wall and Al Thornton are expected to be available to play. For purposes of this thread, I've got both in the starting line-up. Will change this OP up if I hear that Flip is bring them off of the bench.

YOUR Washington Wizards come off of a road loss to the hated Lebron Heat in South Beach. While the depleted Wiz squad played with good effort, their effectiveness was not there and it resulted in an 11 point Heat win.

On to Toronto - home to more than one Chinatown - great food city, scenic, nice people. And a date with the Toronto Raptors. The Raptors have been dealing with injury issues themselves. PF Reggie Evans recently broke his foot and will be out for the foreseeable future. SF Peja Stojakovic has been nursing a knee and is listed as day-to-day.



__________________________

___________John Wall__________________________Jose Calderon
_____18.0 ppg, 9.1 apg, 3.6 rpg______________8.3 ppg, 5.9 apg, 2.4 rpg


__________________________

___________Kirk Hinrich______________________DeMar DeRozan
_____10.9 ppg, 5.0 apg, 2.8 rpg____________11.9 ppg, 1.7 apg, 3.4 rpg


__________________________

___________Al Thornton______________________Sonny Weems
_____10.6 ppg, 4.8 rpt, 1.2 apg____________12.5 ppg, 2.5 rpg, 2.1 apg


__________________________

___.______Andray Blatche______________________Joey Dorsey
_____16.6 ppg, 8.1 rpg, 1.9 apg_____________3.2 ppg, 4.5 rpg, 0.3 apg


__________________________

___.______JaVale McGee______________________Andrea Bargnani
_____9.8 ppg, 8.7 rpg, 2.7 bpg______________20.8 ppg, 5.1 rpg, 0.9 bpg


INJURY NOTES

1) Raptors PF Reggie Evans is out with a broken foot.

2) Raptors SF Peja Stojakovic (knee) is listed as day-to-day and may return very soon.

3) Wizards F/C Yi Jianlian out (bone bruise to knee).

4) Wizards SF Josh Howard is out recovering from off season knee surgery. Per the post two days ago, he's "weeks away".


THE ONE TO WATCH


Wizards G Gilbert Arenas

Mercurial Wizards G Gilbert Arenas will probably come off the bench if Wizards head coach Flip Saunders institutes his opening day line-up. What's different from opening day, however, is Arenas' recent aggressive play and that of his backcourt off-the-bench running mate G Nick Young. Watch to see if Gilbert's play is equally aggressive (as it has been lately) coming off the bench. And to see if the Arenas/Young combo can rain the points down on Toronto.

----------------------------------------------------------

-- Can YOUR Washington Wizards break the road jinx?

-- Who well will Wizards G John Wall and F Al Thornton play, coming off of injuries?

-- Will Hilton Armstrong be suspended for his foul vs the Heat on Monday night?

Post your thoughts, opinions, and comments here:

WHAT: Washington Wizards vs Toronto Raptors

WHERE: Air Canada Centre -- Toronto, ON

WHEN: Wednesday, December 1 - 7:00 p.m. EST

TV: Comcast SportsNet, NBA League Pass

RADIO & STREAMING AUDIO: 106.7 The Fan

How did we go from Howard might play pre-season to now Dec 1st, and he's weeks away?

^
Got that from a WP article a few days back. Let me try and find a link.

Edit:

Link for now. Yahoo Sports capuslizes Flip's comments from two days ago (Nov 28).

Coach Flip Saunders said Howard (knee) is still weeks away from returning, the Associated Press reports.

link

pineappleheadindc wrote:^
Got that from a WP article a few days back. Let me try and find a link.

You didn't have to, I just remember when there was all this talk about how Howard could play pre-season. I wish they wouldn't BS us like that.

^
LOL time to blame it on the Wiz medical staff.

j/k

pineappleheadindc wrote:^
Got that from a WP article a few days back. Let me try and find a link.

Edit:

Link for now. Yahoo Sports capuslizes Flip's comments from two days ago (Nov 28).

Coach Flip Saunders said Howard (knee) is still weeks away from returning, the Associated Press reports.

link

Edit #2: Here is the root article from the AP. It's buried in the game notes section, bottom of story.

Saunders said F Josh Howard(notes), who is recovering from knee surgery, is still weeks away from returning.

Link - Howard scores season-high 32, including winner (11/28/10)

We should definitely be getting our first road win with this game.

pineappleheadindc wrote:^
Got that from a WP article a few days back. Let me try and find a link.

Edit:

Link for now. Yahoo Sports capuslizes Flip's comments from two days ago (Nov 28).

Coach Flip Saunders said Howard (knee) is still weeks away from returning, the Associated Press reports.

link

Yeah, ETA depending on how Gee and AT are playing is Dec 15th. I expect if they are doing well, that may buy him an extra week. Dec 22nd.

So looks to me like AT would come off the bench having been injured and since we are playing a not so talented team. I expect Gee to start again and for them to work AT in as needed as to give him minimal minutes unless otherwise needed. If Flip follows what he has done in the past, Wall will come off the bench also.

They really want to get this first road win behind them.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/co ... 06116.html

Those Wizards went on to win their next three road games, with Arenas capping the win streak with his incredible, career-best 60-point performance in a 147-141 win over the Los Angeles Lakers on Dec. 17 of that season.

"All it takes is one game, on the road to win, and from there, you just get momentum. All it's going to take is just one game to get your confidence," Arenas said, adding that the Wizards' struggles away from home are understandable at this point in the season. "It comes with youth. Inexperienced players, getting a chance to play when they really haven't had a chance to develop any skill. But that's what happens when you're a rebuilding team."

So I'm thinking we get the win then get to see if we can get our first two win streak going by beating Portland at home. Portland has been racking up the Ls after losing 4 straight and with Boston up next. They lost to Phili in Phili and NJ in NJ. http://espn.go.com/nba/team/schedule/_/ ... il-blazers

So if all goes well, we are looking at the Wizard being 7-11 by this Friday Dec 3rd.

We really need this win tonight. It is actually kind of a big game. The losses so far this year can be dismissed as a young team with injuries trying to find themselves and the refs not giving Gil any breaks. But that excuse won't last forever if we don't start to improve our record. You can't dig to deep a hole while we are building.

JWizmentality wrote:How did we go from Howard might play pre-season to now Dec 1st, and he's weeks away?

I was wondering the same thing, earlier the message was that he was ahead of schedule on his rehab. Pencil him in for January......maybe.

well Im not worried about Howard like the others are, just for the simple fact that he was way way way ahead of schedule. It was typical Wiz crap. There is no way he shouldve been that far ahead of the sked. Honestly, I think even though we are holding off on him now, we pushed him so much early that it still probably screwed his knee up. I wouldnt be shocked at all that no matter when he gets out there, his knee isnt right because they had him doing too much stuff early on

Wall, Al, & Yi all practiced yesterday. It would be great to get them back and start this run. If Wall & Al plays then I hope they start over Kirk. No more of Kirk starting, period. This is the perfect game for us to start using the Wall-Gil backcourt without Kirk. Then we can really judge them.

If we start Wall & Gil then I actually think they will play well. Gil's been playing great but his J has been off lately so he should be due in this game. I still say that Dray physically moved better the last 2 games then he did all season long so I think he's finally getting his conditioning & timing back.

Then McGee should go off. I just think that unless we catch the Raps on a crazy hot night (which we seem to do sometimes) then I think we win this game "unless" Flip starts Kirk again. Then anything could happen

Howard, weeks away? I'm thinking 2-3 weeks. He recently said he has a targeted date in December and we could look at the schedule and try to figure it out. He said it's a big week or something like that.

If what he said is correct, there are some big games in this stretch
Tue 14 vs Los Angeles
Thu 16 vs New Jersey Nets
Sat 18 vs Miami
Mon 20 vs Charlotte
Wed 22 vs Chicago
Sun 26 vs San Antonio

Toronto is a terrible basketball team right now and by all rights, we should win this game. Looking at their roster, I'm not sure how they're going to score. Unfortunately, our team is so inconsistent that we can't take anything for granted. Toronto somehow won 4 games in a row just a few games ago.

Blatche should guard Bargnani so McGee is free to roam the paint.

Toronto wants to push the pace to get their athletic wings some easy buckets. We've got to make sure we get back on D. Hopefully, McGee can demoralize them with his offensive rebounding.

Ed Davis will be making his playing debut tonight after spending some time in the D-league getting up to game shape, let's not let him make a big splash tonight.

Them not having Reggie Evans available should help us in the rebounding department.

Hilton Armstrong suspended for one game, tonight's match against the Raptors. READ IT: http://dcprosportsreport.com/2010/12/01/hilton-armstrong-suspended-for-1-game/

Spence wrote:Hilton Armstrong suspended for one game, tonight's match against the Raptors. READ IT: http://dcprosportsreport.com/2010/12/01/hilton-armstrong-suspended-for-1-game/

Miss ya Spence

Spence wrote:Hilton Armstrong suspended for one game, tonight's match against the Raptors. READ IT: http://dcprosportsreport.com/2010/12/01/hilton-armstrong-suspended-for-1-game/

Bad news..... for the Raps.

MUST WIN GAME

This game is so winnable it worries me. I see the Wiz winning their first road game tonight, but if we drop a stinker of a performance, I wouldn't necessarily be surprised. We're still a young, inexperienced team looking for chemistry. Every game is losable. At least he future looks bright