What do East Games 7 and the Emerald City have in common?

You get to both via roads built by copious amounts of bricks.

Good morning. It's a Saturday edition of the newsletter. Let's basketball.

It's Not Thursday, But It Is A Full Collapse

Pistons 93, Magic 79 (Series tied 3-3)

For one half of basketball, it looked like this game would become notorious only among Michiganders as the Pistons no-showed the first 24 en route to a 22-point halftime deficit. It looked a lot like the first few games of the series: Detroit's offense was anemic and Orlando was able to get into the paint and hit open threes. Desmond Bane, in particular, had found a great rhythm, and the Magic were really efficient in putting up a 60-38 halftime lead.

That's right: 60 points in the first half for Orlando. It appeared they'd clinch at home and send Detroit into a terrible summer of questions and doubt.

And then the Magic simply stopped making any shots.

Orlando went 3/17 in the third as the Pistons cut the deficit to single digits. That included the Magic missing their final seven shots of the quarter. But the break didn't help anything: Orlando then missed their first 16 shots of the fourth. Yes: the Magic missed 23 straight shots before an uncontested Paolo Banchero dunk with two minutes remaining. (I think the Pistons were as stunned as everyone else.) In the meantime, Detroit had closed the gap completely and taken a solid lead. The Pistons finished the job as Orlando bricked some more shots, and now we will have Game 7.

The Magic got booed out of the building by the 25% of fans who didn't leave once Detroit went up double digits.

The final damage: Orlando shot 4/37 from the floor in the second half, 2/18 from deep for a total of 19 points. No Magician hit more than one field goal. In the entire second half. In the fourth, Orlando shot 1/20 and 0/10 from three, with a grand total of eight points.