Usually when Washington Wizards head coach Ed Tapscott conducts his pre-game press conference he focuses on who is in the starting lineup, what his team’s strategy is, and he even discusses what his team has worked on during the shootaround or the previous day’s practice.

His press conference prior to Wednesday night’s game against the Charlotte Bobcats, however, had a much different feel to it.

“I’m down to eight (players) tonight, the mighty eight,” Tapscott quipped.  “If I do who is out it’s probably easier:  Caron [Butler] is out tonight, Darius [Songalia] is out tonight, and Juan [Dixon] is out tonight…so I’ll have a bench of three.”

Those injuries, combined with absences of Gilbert Arenas, Etan Thomas, DeShawn Stevenson and Brendan Haywood left the Wizards seemingly helpless against the Charlotte Bobcats.  Not only were they fighting with the Chicago Bulls for the eighth and final playoff spot in the Eastern Conference, but they were on a stretch that had seen them win 9 out of 13 games, including a franchise-best six in a row.

Given the contrasts in fates, it would seem on paper, that the Bobcats would steamroll their way to victory.

As someone famous said, “That is why they play the games.”‘

Not only did the Washington Wizards win the game in close fashion, 95-93, but they basically won with just six players.  Starters Mike James, Javaris Crittenton, Andray Blatche, Dominic McGuire and Antawn Jamison all played at least 32 minutes, while Nick Young played 24 minutes in a reserve role.

Although JaVale McGee and Olesksiy Pecherov played 16 minutes and six minutes respectively, they had a lesser impact on the final outcome.

After the game, Coach Tapscott marveled at the level of effort displayed given the circumstances.

“It wasn’t exactly what I call artistic or elegant, but a win is a win is a win, ” Tapscott said during the post game press conference.  “I thought tonight we really fought.  I thought we really brought some energy and some competitiveness tonight.  We were struggling and we don’t have a lot of players, we got some guys playing a little bit out of position at times and some guys had more minutes than they had ever had before.  But I thought we really fought hard.”

Jamison (27 points and eight rebounds) also weighed in on the tough win.

“Tonight we got a couple breaks that went our way, and we were able to get a win, and right about now, anytime you get a win, its still a good feeling,” Jamison remarked while getting dressed after the game.  “We only had like eight or nine guys dressing and a lot of young guys came through and performed.”

The turning point in the game came at the four minute mark of the second quarter.  The Bobcats, led by Gerald Wallace, went on a 26-11 run to start the quarter, and then took a 20 point lead at 55-35, and it appeared the Wizards were headed for yet another blowout loss.

Young and Jamison slowly started getting easy shots both in and out of the paint, and  collectively the Wizards buckled down and played tough defense on the Bobcats.  The result was a 15-2 run of their own that cut the lead to 57-50.

When Nick Young was asked what turned things around in that second quarter, he kept it short and sweet.

“We just played defense and made hustle plays,” Young (23 points) said while smiling broadly.

Jamison elaborated a bit when he described that same second quarter turn around.

“When we came back toward the end of the second quarter, we outworked them and limited them to one shot, ” Jamison said.  “And then we got some easy baskets, and we knew that to win we were definitely going to have to do that in third quarter.”

That third quarter Jamison mentioned has been a sore spot for the Wizards all season.  During this losing season, the Wizards would either lose leads in the third quarter or fall so far behind that the game was would be out of reach.  Against the Bobcats, led by Jamison’s eight points, the Wizards were finally able to win a third quarter 23-14.

This game within the game was a source of great pride for Coach Tapscott.

“I will say with a great sense of pride we won a third quarter tonight.  And maybe that’s one of the keys to getting a win, is completing that third quarter, because that was a big part of our success tonight, ” Tapscott observed.  “And confidence is an infectious thing, all of a sudden we make a few plays and then we have some confidence, and then everyone’s play picked up and we sorta’ kept fighting through.”

Jamison also stressed the importance of finally breaking through during that third quarter.

“We really put an emphasis on that.  That’s been our Achilles’ heel pretty much whole season.”

During the fourth quarter fatigue started to set in, and despite holding the lead by as much as eight points at one point, it took some bad free throw shooting by the Bobcats, timely free throw shooting by the Jamison, and a key block by Young on Boris Diaw to seal the victory.

The Wizards next contest is on Saturday night when they take on the Detroit Pistons, but they won’t have to worry about dressing only eight players for that matchup.  Someone named Gilbert Arenas is scheduled to be in the starting lineup and Jamison cannot wait.

“He makes the game so easy, I can’t wait for him to get out there so I can get some open jumpshots,” Jamison said, while barely containing his smile.

Given how hard the Wizards had to work for a victory without him, even 80 percent of Arenas will be a welcome site to the entire team.