Howard sets all-time Magic scoring record

By foxsports
Published

It's been a record-setting week for the Orlando Magic thus far, and fortunately for Orlando, the most recent record broken was one the Magic were glad to see fall.
One night after scoring a franchise-low 56 points on a franchise-low 24.6 percent shooting in Boston, the Magic bounced back with a 102-83 win over the Indiana Pacers. 
Superstar center Dwight Howard had 14 points and nine rebounds in the win, but his biggest basket of the night — and maybe one of the biggest buckets of his career — came on a two-handed dunk with 10 minutes left in the third quarter.
Howard's dunk, which tied the game at 49-49, moved Howard into the No. 1 spot on the Magic's all-time regular-season scoring list, passing Orlando legend Nick Anderson's mark of 10,650 career points for the top spot. By the end of the game, Howard had settled at 10,657 points, putting him alone at the top as the greatest scorer in Magic history — a place where he's likely to stay for years to come.
Anderson and Howard stand alone as the two most prolific scorers in team history, both more than 2,300 points ahead of Tracy McGrady and 2,600 points ahead of Shaquille O'Neal. The nearest current Magic player to Howard is Hedo Turkoglu, who has scored 6,814 points in 448 career regular-season games with the Magic.
Of course, when you factor in postseason games, some of those numbers get flipped around, and you find that Howard has held the playoff-inclusive record for a while. 
With Howard's 57 career playoff games considered, he has scored 11,790 points in a Magic uniform, more than 500 points more than Anderson, who tallied 11,258 career points with Orlando, including his 44 career postseason appearances with the team.
The next-closest player on that list is O'Neal, who scored 8,930 points, including 911 points in 36 career playoff games. McGrady is fourth on the playoff-inclusive list with 8,780 points, followed by Penny Hardaway (7,997) and Turkoglu (7,447).
But none of them hold a candle to Howard, who, at 26 years old, has already made an indelible impact on the franchise that drafted him. It's unclear what Howard's future will hold, but the hope around Orlando is that he'll stay with the Magic and keep adding to his franchise record for years to come.
For now, though, let's look back on some of the top scoring games in Howard's young, yet fruitful career. CLICK HERE or click the embedded image for a look at the 10 top scoring games — including the playoffs — since the Magic selected No. 12 first overall in 2004.
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