In the moments following their 117-112 loss on Wednesday, the Washington Wizards’ locker room wasn’t quite the morgue-like atmosphere you might expect.
After fighting back from 18 points down in the final six minutes of the game to pull within one point, Toronto guard Mike James drained a pair of huge 3-pointers in the final minute to ensure that the Wizards’ push to reach .500 for the first time since Dec. 6 once again would be denied.
“If we had lost this kind of game about a month or two ago, this room would have been awful,” forward Antawn Jamison said. “This is not the same team where a loss like this would have lasted four or five games. But we’re feeling a lot better about ourselves than we have in a long time.”
This is likely the byproduct of the team’s recent good play, which is a sign that things might finally be starting to turn around for the Wizards (21-23).
Before the loss at Toronto, the Wizards were playing some of their best basketball of the season, winning eight of 11 games. Now the Wizards have a chance to firmly establish themselves among the top eight teams in the Eastern Conference during a nine-game stretch that includes a season-high five-game homestand.
“We’ve been hovering pretty much around .500 all season,” Jamison said. “There’s no excuse for us that when these five games are over we shouldn’t be two or three games above .500. Having said that, I think we all know the importance of this five-game stretch before we hit the road before the break is over with. It’s a great opportunity for us.”
There were clear signs during the 11-game stretch before Toronto that the Wizards were finally playing the type of defense that could move them up in the Eastern Conference standings from their No. 8 spot.
The Wizards’ defense hasn’t instilled much fear in its foes, allowing opponents to score points relatively easily (99.3 a game). Washington has also allowed opposing teams too many good looks at the basket, resulting in a robust field-goal percentage (45.7 percent).
But during that 11-game stretch, it looked as if the Wizards were starting to embrace the concept of defending and not just giving it lip service. The Wizards cut their foes’ scoring average down to 90 points a game. And three teams — tonight’s opponent Atlanta (13-31), Philadelphia and Indiana — were held to 72, 76 and 79 points, respectively.
“That has been our focus all year and now we’re starting to feel comfortable playing defense,” Wizards forward Caron Butler said. “We have to keep turning it up. I think the difference is that we’re trusting each other more than we did at the beginning of the season.”
Lost on nobody is the fact that there are teams they’ll face in the coming week like Orlando and Philadelphia that likely will be in a group of about seven teams battling for the final four Eastern Conference seeds. And after this home stretch, the Wizards will play a pair of road games before the All-Star break.
So even though it’s called the midpoint of the season, the Wizards will have played 51 games when the second half begins Feb. 21 when Minnesota visits MCI Center.
“Everyone pretty much knows that the season is all downhill after the break. So this is real important for us,” Jamison said.
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