MIAMI — Shaquille O'Neal flopped against Orlando center Dwight Howard. Now he's standing up to Magic coach Stan Van Gundy.

Responding to Van Gundy's reaction about O'Neal's tactics against Howard on Tuesday night, the Phoenix center lashed out at his former coach with the Miami Heat, calling him "a master of panic," a "nobody" and "a frontrunner."

"One thing I really despise is a frontrunner," O'Neal said before the Suns played the Heat, Shaq's first time back in Miami since last season's trade. "I know for a fact he's a master of panic and when it gets time for his team to go into the postseason and do certain things, he will let them down because of his panic. I've been there before. I've played for him."

O'Neal was guarding Howard with about 4 minutes left in the third quarter Tuesday night. Howard made a spin move, O'Neal fell to the court in an effort to get an offensive foul called, and the Magic center easily dunked with two hands.

Afterward, Van Gundy said he was "shocked, seriously. I was shocked and very disappointed because he knows what it's like. You know, let's stand up and play like men, and I think our guy did that."

O'Neal, who typically does not talk before Suns games, didn't hold back when asked for his reaction. He played for Van Gundy in Miami for parts of two seasons and openly complained about coaching decisions in the 2005 Eastern Conference finals, when the Heat lost Game 7 at home to the Detroit Pistons.

"Flopping is playing like that your whole career," O'Neal said. "I was trying to take a charge, trying to get a call. Yeah, it probably was a flop, but flopping is wrong. Flopping would describe his coaching."

O'Neal and Van Gundy even had words about it on the sideline in Tuesday's game, which the Magic won 111-99. O'Neal had 19 points and 11 rebounds.

And Van Gundy brought the fall up in his postgame news conference, without even being asked.

"Note this," Van Gundy said. "It's not often that I will needle Shaq, because he's a big guy and he played for me and helped me win a lot of games. But he always talks about people flopping. Only one big guy tried to flop tonight. He tried to flop. So ask him about that. I told him something on the sideline. I said, 'C'mon now, all the griping you do about flopping and you're trying to take a flop."'

O'Neal said he admitted to Van Gundy in that conversation that it was a flop.

But it was the postgame comments that truly seemed to raise Shaq's ire.

"I'm not going to sit around and let nobodies take shots at me," O'Neal said. "He is a nobody to me. If he thinks he can get a little press conference and take shots at me like I'm not take one back, he has another thing coming. ... I tried to take a charge. The rules say when a guy comes into your chest and you fall, it's an offensive foul. That's all I tried to do. I fell. I didn't complain."

Even the Heat found the whole Flop Flap intriguing.

"Hopefully they play Orlando again. I don't think they do," Heat guard Dwyane Wade said.

So with that, O'Neal added a new level of intrigue to his long-awaited return to Miami. He was introduced last among Phoenix's starters, with public address announcer Michael Baiamonte saying, "The Miami Heat welcome back Number 32, Shaquille O'Neal."

There were a few whistles but mostly applause and cheers from the crowd, which hadn't seen O'Neal play in Miami since Jan. 21, 2008. He sat out the last nine home games of his Heat career before the trade to Phoenix.

O'Neal also took the opportunity for some theater at that point. He went to midcourt to shake hands with Heat owner Micky Arison and his family, plus walked back across the court to the Heat pregame huddle for more handshakes with coach Erik Spoelstra, assistant coach Bob McAdoo and others.

And then he and Wade embraced shortly before tip-off. Thus ended the lovefest: O'Neal's first basket was a dunk with 10:22 left in the opening quarter, and some fans booed.

O'Neal said before the game, however the crowd received him, it would be out of respect. "I'm not going to go home and drink rat urine," he said, slightly modifying a phrase he's used before.

When he was traded to the Suns, O'Neal had a few choice words about having to play with Ricky Davis and Chris Quinn last season in Miami, although he said Wednesday he was only responding to a question and didn't mean anything to be taken in a derogatory way.

And there was a clear sense that O'Neal simply quit on the Heat last season.

"My grandma always said, you forgive, but you don't forget," Wade said. "I live by those words. I forgive a lot of guys. I'm that kind of person. But I don't forget what he said, either."

Wade is still friendly with O'Neal, but the two do not speak often. O'Neal's closest remaining friend on the Heat is Udonis Haslem, whom Shaq sought out for an embrace with 6› minutes left in the pregame warmup Wednesday. Dorell Wright — another holdover from the Shaq era — joined them a few seconds later, and the trio talked for about a minute.

It's not likely such an embrace will happen when Phoenix next plays Orlando.

The relationship between Van Gundy and O'Neal has seemed to be tenuous at best for years, and may have just turned downright frosty.

O'Neal came to Miami for the 2004-05 season, helped the Heat win 59 games that season alongside Dwyane Wade and with Van Gundy on the sideline. But that season ended with the loss to the Pistons, a game where Miami wasted a six-point lead over the final 7 minutes and afterward O'Neal said he didn't get the ball enough.

He also added that night, "I'll take the blame. I always do."

Van Gundy resigned 21 games into the next season, Pat Riley took over once again and the Heat won a championship, O'Neal's fourth title.