Wizards Look to Shake Road Woes in New York
Monday night's solid win against the Dallas Mavericks, halting one of the league's best teams' hot twelve game winning streak, ought to give the Wizards a jolt of confidence as they head tonight to Madison Square Garden to face off against the hapless New York Knicks. Should, but likely won't, for the simple reason that the game won't be played in Washington, D.C. Not that MSG is a particularly intimidating venue these days -- the Knicks are a league-worst 2-7 at home. Rather, the Wizards have been bad -- very bad -- on the road, responsible for, among other things, an embarrassing 82-102 loss that gave the Knicks one of their two home wins.
Indeed, at 0-8 D.C.'s managed to wrack up the league's worst record at 0-8, getting blown out not only by the Knicks but by the terrible Memphis Grizzlies back on November 24.
What's wrong? Just about everything. "Arenas has been horrible on the road, obviously" observed ESPN's John Hollinger in a Monday online chat session, "but even more than that the defense has been terrible." And, indeed, it's been looking pretty ugly. But neither has the road offense impressed. At home, the Wizards have been scoring 110.6 points per game, compared to just 88.3 per game on the road. In part, the road scoring woes reflect the Wizards going off their style on the road, playing at a slower pace and attempting fewer field goals and free throws.
Photo by SportsPhotog, used under a Creative Commons license.
The efficiency, however, is unimpressive as well. At home, the Wiz shoot a solid 48 percent from the field and an outstanding 39 percent on three pointers. On the road that drops to 40 percent and a terrible 24 percent respectively. And, indeed, star Gilbert Arenas is a major source of the problem, offering up some one of the most dramatic home-road splits in the Association. Safely home in the Verizon Center, Arenas is shooting spectacularly, 50 percent from the field, and 46 percent from behind the arc. He gets to the line 9.3 times a game and hits 87 percent of his foul shots. On the road, he's still a respectable 81 percent from the charity stripe but gets about two fewer shots. His field goal percentage, meanwhile, heads straight for the toilet -- 28 percent, with three point shooting tumbling as well to 26 percent.
Antawn Jamison has also seen his shooting decline on the road, especially from three point land where he goes from great (41 percent) to terrible (24 percent). Caron Butler's actually been doing slightly better on the road, in the midst of a career season that's getting lost in the team's general struggles.
Fundamentally, however, a Wizards team that lacking in depth and strong defenders simply needs good performances from its star point guard. Last year, the team's offense collapsed when Agent Zero was off the floor, scoring 12.6 fewer points per 48 minutes than they did when he was playing. This year, on the road, he might as well not be there. Despite the dramatic difference in output, it's the same game whether played in D.C. or not. The problem, then, is purely mental but confidence problems can become hard to shake once everyone's noticing. Fortunately, a matchup against the Knicks -- almost as bad of a home team as the Wizards on the road -- may be just the thing the doctor ordered to get the spring back in Arenas' shot.