INDEPENDENCE — At first glance, it looks like a matchup between two of the best teams in the NBA.

In reality, when the Cavaliers take on the Orlando Magic on Wednesday night at Amway Arena it will be a meeting of two potentially great teams who are currently trying to find themselves.

“We’re not a very good basketball team right now,” Magic coach Stan Van Gundy told reporters after his team got drubbed 102-74 Sunday night in Oklahoma City. “I’ve been saying that, but nobody is listening.”

Nobody listened because Orlando, which eliminated Cleveland in six games last season in the Eastern Conference finals, was 5-0 until falling to the Thunder. Orlando plays in Charlotte tonight.

“We’re totally predicated on shooting,” Van Gundy said. “We do not have any kind of defensive mind-set, we don’t have much toughness and we’re not very smart. So, right now, we’re not a very good team.”

In starting the season 4-3, including two losses at home, the Cavaliers haven’t been very good, either, but that’s not going to lessen the hype Wednesday night, as Cleveland, Orlando and Boston are widely considered the three best teams in the East.

Toss in the offseason addition of Cavaliers center Shaquille O’Neal — he has been critical of Van Gundy in the past while also claiming Cleveland will no longer have to double-team Orlando superstar Dwight Howard in the low post — and this meeting will be about as anticipated as a regular-season game in the third week of the season can be.

“It’s the team that beat us last year,” O’Neal said Monday after practice at Cleveland Clinic Courts. “It’s a pretty big game.”

The aura around the 7-foot-1, 325-pound O’Neal, who began his career with the Magic after being the first player selected in the 1992 NBA Draft, will make it bigger still.

Add in the fact O’Neal last season called Van Gundy “the master of panic” after he felt the Orlando coach publicly criticized him, and the Amway Arena crowd figures to be very hostile when LeBron James and Co. take the court.

“I’ve never been critical, but I will defend myself every time,” O’Neal said when asked about his comments about Van Gundy. “It’s not my style to call people out, but if people call me out, I will defend myself. You smack me, I’ll punch you, every time. I don’t care who it is.”

That’s as close as the effervescent O’Neal came to giving media members what they wanted Monday, as he, James and Cleveland coach Mike Brown were all business.

Asked if there was enough room on the court for two Supermans — Howard has that moniker now, while O’Neal had it in the past — O’Neal said: “My only concern is winning championships. I’m not concerned about all that. I’ve been there, done that.”

O’Neal conceded Howard was “pretty good” — “He’s young, agile and active, but it’s nothing I haven’t seen,” — but reiterated what he said at his introductory press conference about Cleveland no longer needing to double-team the Orlando center.

Brown, meanwhile, didn’t come right out and confirm the Cavaliers would allow O’Neal to defend Howard one-on-one in the low post, but he sure sounded like he was leaning that way.

“He’s got four (championship) rings and he’s been around 17 years,” Brown said of O’Neal. “He’s got a good idea of what’s going on.”

At the moment, these two teams don’t.

Despite its fast start, Orlando was without guard Vince Carter (ankle) and forward Ryan Anderson (ankle) against Oklahoma City. The new acquisitions were both listed as day-to-day going into the Charlotte game.

Magic power forward Rashard Lewis, who torched the Cavaliers from the perimeter in the playoffs, is serving a 10-game suspension after testing positive for a banned substance in the offseason.

Toss in the offseason departure of Hedo Turkoglu, a 6-10 forward with point guard skills who killed the Cavaliers in the playoffs while running the pick-and-roll with Howard, plus the trading of starters Rafer Alston and Courtney Lee, and Orlando is a much different team than the one that eliminated Cleveland.

The Magic started offseason acquisitions Matt Barnes and Brandon Bass at forward against Oklahoma City, along with Howard, J.J. Redick and Jameer Nelson, an All-Star point guard who didn’t play against the Cavaliers in the playoffs due to a shoulder injury.

Unlike the Magic, the Cavaliers have been fairly healthy, but they’ve had to deal with the Delonte West saga and the offseason acquisitions of O’Neal, Anthony Parker and Jamario Moon.

Cleveland also made a lineup change Friday against New York, Brown saying on Monday he will continue to start second-year man J.J. Hickson at power forward and bring Anderson Varejao off the bench.

“J.J. played with some pretty good energy and juice in the New York game,” Brown said. “It allowed me to get a better feel on Andy’s minutes. We’ll stick with it until I feel I need to make a change again.”

The Cavaliers will have had four days off going into the Orlando game, so they should be rested and ready. Whether that translates into a better and more consistent performance on the court remains to be seen.

“Obviously, they knocked us out of the playoffs last year,” Brown said. “They’re a very good team, a very well-coached team. Hopefully, it will be a little different this year.”

Counting the playoffs, the Cavaliers have lost six straight games in Orlando, a number of them lopsided affairs.

“It should be a fun game,” James said. “We’re going into a hostile environment where we haven’t been successful in a long time. We’re looking forward to going down there and getting better.”

Like O’Neal, the often fun-loving James was all business Monday, but insisted he wasn’t putting any added importance on the first meeting of the season against Orlando.

“I’m going down there to try and dominate like I always do,” James said.

Next up

• Who: Cleveland at Orlando
• When: Wednesday, 8 p.m.
• Where: Amway Arena, Orlando
• TV/radio: FS Ohio, Channel 43, ESPN; WEOL 930-AM, WTAM 1100-AM

Contact Rick Noland at (330) 721-4061 or rickn@ohio.net.

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