Magic Rips Howard: Lakers Legend Says Dwight Howard Let Team Down By Being Ejected

After the San Antonio Spurs beat the Los Angeles Lakers for the fourth time on Sunday, completing a sweep, Lakers legend Magic Johnson lashed out at center Dwight Howard for his poor play in a series of Twitter posts from Monday. The tweets have since been deleted but are available in a USA Today article about Johnson's displeasure with Howard.

"Laker Nation: Dwight Howard that was a big No, No," wrote Johnson on Monday morning. "Your teammates and the fans were counting on you." Minutes later, he tweeted, "LN: Dwight, I've been swept before but I never let my team down by getting kicked out of the game." And in a third post directed at Howard, Johnson wrote, "LN: Dwight with an already depleted team you couldn't afford to foul out or get kicked out. Having you on the floor was the only chance for the @Lakers."

The former Laker also expressed his happiness that the season is over for his old team, and said that "with the talent on this team this could go down as one of the worst seasons in Lakers' history!"

Asked after the game on Sunday about what he thought of the season, Dwight Howard told the press it had been "a nightmare."

"A bad dream," he said. "I couldn't wake up out of it. It seemed like nothing could go right from the start."

At the beginning of the season, the Lakers were slated to be a championship contender; after struggling for much of the year, they narrowly made the playoffs after a spell of ramped-up play spearheaded by Kobe Bryant. With Bryant out with a torn Achilles heel, it was expected that Dwight Howard would have to pick up much of the slack in order for the Lakers to compete.

In Game 4 of the series, Howard was ejected after drawing his second technical foul with 9:51 remaining in the third quarter and his team down by 21 points.

He had drawn a hard foul around the basket - the last of many, as the Spurs were adopting the strategy of making Howard earn his points at the foul line, where he performs dismally, rather than giving him layups or dunks. He drew his first technical for throwing an elbow and a second for arguing with the official.

"I've just got to do a better job of keeping my cool," he said afterward. "It's an emotional game, and I don't want to lose. Sometimes you don't react the right way."