Howard powers Magic to Game 3 win over Celtics

ORLANDO (AP) — Into the stands. Off the backboard or in another player's face, Dwight Howard sent Boston Celtics' shots everywhere.

Howard had 17 points, 14 rebounds and five blocks to lift the Orlando Magic to a 117-96 victory over the Celtics on Friday night and a 2-1 series lead in their Eastern Conference semifinal.

GAME REPORT: Magic 117, Celtics 96

PLAYOFF GALLERY: Photos from the postseason

"Just the whole team stepped up the defensive intensity," said Howard, the NBA's defensive player of the year. "It starts with me. I have to do that every night if we want to be successful."

Rashard Lewis had 28 points, and Hedo Turkoglu scored 24 for Orlando, which played without starting point guard Rafer Alston. He was suspended by the NBA for slapping Eddie House in the back of the head in Game 2.

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Paul Pierce broke out of his series slump to score 27 points, and Rajon Rondo added 15 for the defending champion Celtics, who trimmed a 20-point deficit to seven before the Magic regained control.

"You give them their inside game and their outside game, then you don't have a chance," Pierce said.

Game 4 is Sunday in Orlando, and Magic coach Stan Van Gundy said he won't spend time enjoying his team's latest win.

"This is not the time of year to celebrate a win in the playoffs, especially against a team like Boston," Van Gundy said. "It's basically like being at halftime with a one-point lead."

It was the second time this postseason the Magic won with a starter suspended.

Howard lost his cool and threw an elbow at Samuel Dalembert's head to draw a suspension for Game 6 of their first-round series against Philadelphia — but Orlando still managed to get a blowout win and eliminate the 76ers.

Anthony Johnson had 13 points in place of Alston.

"I can't explain that," Van Gundy said about winning shorthanded.

But this time, it was the Magic's big man who made sure a teammate wasn't missed.

Howard had four blocks in the first half, forcing the Celtics into a jumpshooting team much like the Magic did to win Game 1. On the first play of the second quarter, Howard soared so high he had to brace his left hand against the backboard so he wouldn't smack his head, swatting Stephon Marbury's layup attempt into the stands.

It was no different on offense.

Howard sprinted down the middle of the lane to take a pass zipped from the wing by J.J. Redick, gripping the ball with two hands for a thunderous dunk that gave Orlando a 43-31 lead. The Magic would eventually go ahead by 14 points in the period.

"Our defense was awful. They made every shot," Celtics coach Doc Rivers said. "I thought they were the aggressors and we were the retaliators all night."

The Magic took a 20-point lead early in the third quarter before Howard picked up his fourth foul, and the Celtics ended the period on a 12-2 run capped by a breakaway dunk by Rondo.

The Celtics trimmed the deficit to seven in the fourth, and just when it appeared they would complete the comeback, center Kendrick Perkins lost his cool.

Perkins was called for a flagrant one foul with 10:15 remaining for an elbow on Mickael Pietrus. Replays showed Perkins' elbow hit Pietrus in the chin while the two were battling for position away from the ball, the kind of play the NBA has been reviewing — and sometimes giving out suspensions — in a postseason that's only becoming more physical.

Rivers reiterated that he doesn't believe in postseason suspensions and that players should serve their penalty in the following regular season. Van Gundy agreed.

"I understand what the NBA is trying to do and trying to prevent, and I respect that," Van Gundy said. "But it is getting to the point now that every time somebody gets hit somebody has to get up there lobbying trying to get a guy suspended."

Notes: G Courtney Lee returned for the Magic with a protective mask after missing the first two games of the series recovering from a fractured sinus. He finished with 11 points in 32 minutes. ... The Magic haven't made it to the conference finals since Shaquille O'Neal and Penny Hardaway led them in 1996.

Copyright 2009 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

30K evacuate as winds whip raging Calif. wildfire

SANTA BARBARA, Calif. (AP) — Turning the horizon a lurid orange and raining embers on roofs as it advanced, a raging wildfire that has destroyed scores of homes in the hills menaced this celebrity enclave and other coastal towns Friday, and the number of people ordered to flee climbed to 30,000.

Authorities warned an additional 23,000 to be ready to leave at a moment's notice.

Columns of smoke rose off the Santa Ynez Mountains as the 4-day-old blaze — fanned by "sundowner" winds that sweep down the slopes in the evening — blew up from 2,700 acres to 3,500 in less than a day, creating a firefighting front five miles long.

"It's crazy. The whole mountain looked like an inferno," said Maria Martinez, 50, who with her fiance hurriedly left her home in San Marcos Pass, on the edge of Santa Barbara. The couple went to an evacuation center at the University of California, Santa Barbara.

An unknown number of homes were destroyed in the blowup that began Thursday night, in addition to the estimated 75 houses that burned the night before on the ridges and in the canyons above Santa Barbara.

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No deaths or serious injuries were reported.

The number of people ordered to evacuate rose to 30,500 from 12,000 the night before as the blaze pushed west toward neighboring Goleta and east toward well-to-do Montecito.

"Literally last night, all hell broke loose," Santa Barbara Fire Chief Andrew DiMizio said Friday morning, recounting firefighters' efforts to put out roof fires and keep flames out of his section of the city.

The eight-member Wasjutin family arrived at the university campus in three cars and a trailer packed with four dogs, eight baby chickens, two cockatiels, an iguana, a rat named Cutie and an African spur tortoise. They fled their 40-acre San Marcos Pass property after watching the flames grow closer. They left three horses and three hens behind.

"We drove down through fire on both sides," said Silvia Wasjutin, 48, a speech pathologist.

In a scene of strange contrasts, students bicycled to classes and midterms as ash fell on campus, and boats bobbed in Santa Barbara's harbor as smoke rose from the mountains above town.

The Santa Barbara area has long been a favorite of celebrities. Oprah Winfrey has an estate in Montecito, where Charlie Chaplin's old seaside escape, the Montecito Inn, has stood since 1928. A ranch in the mountains that Ronald and Nancy Reagan bought became his Western retreat during his presidency.

More than 2,300 firefighters battled the blaze, using at least 246 engines, 14 air tankers and 15 helicopters. A DC-10 jumbo jet tanker capable of dumping huge loads of retardant began making runs on the fire in the afternoon.

The cause of the blaze, which broke out Tuesday, remained under investigation.

Evacuation shelters were set up, and hotels offered deals to evacuees.

"Right now, if you're not evacuated in the Santa Barbara area, you are sheltering evacuees," DiMizio said.

Oscar Funez, 39, his wife, Patricia, 42, and their son, Augustin, 4, were watching the fire on television Thursday night when they noticed other tenants leaving their Santa Barbara apartment building. They packed a suitcase and fled, too.

"It's our fourth fire in Santa Barbara. We know we have to have everything — paperwork, clothes, everything — ready to go," Oscar Funez said.

The family spent the night on cots at the university, and their little boy was given a stuffed elephant toy by a Red Cross worker. "We must be bad parents, because we didn't bring his stuffed animals," his father joked.

At historic Santa Barbara Mission, established by the Spanish in 1786, the Rev. Tom Messner was one of three friars permitted to remain during the evacuation. He helped make sandwiches for the firefighters.

Messner said there was plenty of smoke, but "I can't see the flames, and we have firetrucks in front of the place, so we feel very safe." The church, a major tourist attraction, was built in 1820, after an earthquake destroyed the previous structure.

Officials said 11 firefighters had been injured, including three burned in a firestorm Wednesday. They were reported in good condition at a Los Angeles burn center.

Copyright 2009 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.