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Oladipo Misses Saturday's Game With Sore Achilles

Josh Cohen
Digital News Manager

By John Denton

Jan. 31, 2015

ORLANDO – The Orlando Magic took another hit Saturday night when Victor Oladipo was unable to play because of a strained right Achilles. But the standout shooting guard is hopeful that the injury is a minor one and it won’t keep him out for an extended period of time.

Oladipo sprained his ankle during Thursday’s loss to the Milwaukee Bucks and in the process he injured his right Achilles’ tendon. He played through the pain during that game, but the injury started to bother him late Thursday night.

Oladipo was unable to practice on Friday and he still felt pain on Saturday when he tried to warm up before Orlando’s game against the Dallas Mavericks.

``When I rolled my ankle two days ago, I think I strained my Achilles a little bit,’’ Oladipo said. ``It was hurting (on Friday) and I didn’t do anything. It’s pretty much the same and it didn’t get any better. I tried to go out there and shoot, but it hurts to shoot jump shots so that’s a problem. I don’t want to mess around with it because that’s a pretty serious deal. So I just left it alone.’’

With Oladipo out, the Magic started Evan Fournier at shooting guard on Saturday night. Oladipo is coming off the best month of his professional career (20.6 points per game in January) and is averaging 16.6 points, 3.8 rebounds and 3.8 assists a game this season.

Oladipo had medical tape around his lower right leg on Saturday and said the injury was the result of an awkward landing. He hopes that sitting out on Saturday will help the injury and allow him to play on Monday when the Magic face the Thunder in Oklahoma City.

``It was after I shot a three and missed it. I was guarding OJ Mayo and I tried to body him up and I landed on my ankle real weird. I was hobbling around after that,’’ Oladipo said. ``My Achilles wasn’t really (hurting) me until that night. After that, there was still a little bit of strain and pain, so I’m just chilling right now.’’

LINEUP CHANGE: Orlando made another lineup change on Saturday night, benching struggling power forward Channing Frye in favor of Tobias Harris. For Harris, who struggled with the transition to being used off the bench, the switch didn’t come a minute too soon.

Harris was in the midst of his finest NBA season prior to slipping on a wet spot and spraining his left ankle three weeks ago in Los Angeles. In his first 37 games of the season, Harris was averaging 18 points, 6.9 rebounds and 2.0 assists a game – all numbers that were on pace to be his best ever. Also, Harris was playing some of his most efficient basketball while shooting 47.1 percent from the floor and 40.5 percent from 3-point range.

The ankle sprain on Jan. 9 caused Harris to miss five games and when he returned on Jan. 21, head coach Jacque Vaughn shifted Harris into a reserve role to ``balance the offense.’’

Following the switch, Harris’ numbers tumbled. In his five games as a reserve, Harris played 10 fewer minutes a game and his production (10.8 points, 4.2 rebounds and 1.0 assists) fell dramatically. Also, Harris shot just 33.9 percent from the floor and 18.2 percent from 3-point range when coming off the bench.

``I just have to get myself going and get out there and get some easy ones,’’ Harris said. ``For me, it’s just about continuing to play as hard as I can and stay focused. It’s just something that I’ve watched film on a lot from the last game. It’s just about me playing hard and it will come around for me.’’

Vaughn said before Saturday’s game against Dallas that he will continue to evaluate Harris’ role. He said that Harris’ time as a reserve can’t be fully analyzed yet because some of that time was with Harris working his way back from the ankle injury.

``There’s not a lot of sample size and with him coming back from injury, I don’t think you can look at it fairly,’’ Vaughn said. ``And because of the minute differential also – Tobias at one point was leading us in minutes – so it’s a little different. His shots per minute are about the same – 4.2 (as a starter) and 4.1 (as a reserve). So we’ll get him to take more efficient shots while he is on the floor. I’ll continue to search and see where his comfort level is coming off the bench or starting or (playing extended) minutes.’’

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