Repeat it over and over: The Orlando Magic are a Playoff team

The Orlando Magic enter the All-Star Break one-half game out of the final Playoff spot. The rest of the season is about one thing: Making the postseason.

It was the second game of the season and the familiar sinking feeling was settling in.

The game before, the Orlando Magic put together an impressive victory over the Miami Heat in their home opener, riding the brilliant and surprising play of Mohamed Bamba in the fourth quarter with Aaron Gordon leading the charge to get that first win. It was a twinkle in the eye of the season, but there was a reason to believe things were different.

The Charlotte Hornets provided a dose of reality a few nights later. Things had not changed much at all.

The Magic’s offense would still fall short and the defense would collapse. The team was susceptible to getting torn up by point guards like Kemba Walker and they could only watch the score increase and the deficit grow larger.

That 30-point loss to the Hornets felt so familiar for that reason. It said less about the Hornets and their typical dominance of the Magic than it did of the poor culture the Magic still had to shed. Losing like that could not become normal again, but here it was in the second game of the season.

Anyone who saw that team play would not agree with what should be evident after the Magic returned the favor at the Amway Center with a 127-89 victory. The team has evolved to where one goal remains clear and achievable. And it is time for everyone to say it and believe it:

The Orlando Magic are a Playoff team.

With the All-Star Break now set to begin, the Orlando Magic find themselves one-half game behind the Miami Heat and Detroit Pistons for the final spot. The Magic trail the Hornets by one game for the Southeast Division lead. The Brooklyn Nets are a mere three games ahead of them for the sixth seed.

The reality is with 20-plus games left in the season (about a quarter of the season), the Magic are in as much control over their destiny to make the Playoffs as any other team. Sure they still have a half game to make up, but that is no problem to make if the team merely focuses on itself and winning the games it can.

For the first time since the rebuild began, Orlando is in a Playoff chase with all the pressure and intensity that comes with it. Also the joy. Winning games and playing meaningful games is fun. That excitement is seen throughout the roster and it has bred confidence so far.

The Magic are playing their best basketball of the season right now.

Building the win streak

Orlando has its first five-game win streak since November 2015 and has won seven of its last eight games. That has helped the team rise in the standings quickly in an Eastern Conference that sometimes feels like a race to the bottom.

The Magic certainly are not going to apologize for taking advantage of a system that has put them in this position. They are living out something players dreamed about early on in the season. A goal they longed to achieve and an opportunity that eluded them — through their own frustrations — in previous years.

Orlando wanted meaningful games later in the season and they are getting them now.

What comes with those meaningful games is not a feeling of accomplishing this small sign of progress. What comes instead is the expectation that they make good on the opportunity and achieve the goal.

The standings reality clearly shows the Magic are in the race. But it is how the season has developed and grown that has put the team in this position.

A winding road

As the season has wound its way through after that blowout loss to the Hornets early in the season, the Magic showed signs of their potential but rarely put things together. The team could hardly string together consecutive wins. While Orlando never suffered the long losing streaks that buried their seasons, they had not made their move.

There were a lot of frustrating signs. Orlando lost leads of double-digits in four of six games on a January West Coast trip. That seemed to put the Magic at their lowest point. They clearly showed they had the ability to compete and were just coming up short of their potential.

This was a Playoff team then. Just one that was falling short of that potential and that goal.

This win streak is proving this team’s potential. In that winning stretch, the Magic are winning games by an average of 15.5 points per game. It includes two 30-point wins.

The team, roughly average defensively for much of the season, climbed into the top-10 and the offense suddenly came alive. The Magic are still in the bottom of the league in offensive rating, but the defense is one of the best in the league. Orlando has proven itself a tough team to play.

The clear goal

Will this last? That part is still unclear. The team has shown its propensity both to be the struggling team it was throughout January and the team that is soaring now.

There is no doubt what this team’s potential is now. Orlando has put itself in position to achieve its most basic goal from the beginning of the season.

Nothing short of making the Playoffs should be considered a success at this point.

Orlando Magic

All that is left is to go out and do it. All that is left is to believe they can.

At this point in the season, there are no more trades to ponder or future moves to make until the Draft comes along. There is only the focus on achieving that goal. There is only this team.

And it deserves to be said and repeated by everyone inside and outside the organization: The Orlando Magic are a Playoff team.

There is no more evidence of this then the last eight games.

The team has the best net rating (+15.0 points per 100 possessions) among NBA team’s last eight games. In a league seeing record offensive output, the Magic have given up 98.8 points per 100 possessions, the top mark in the league in this time frame, in the last eight games.

That might be opponent based and there is plenty to nitpick there.

But the Magic are seeing young players like Jonathan Isaac emerge and realize their potential. Khem Birch, Wesley Iwundu and Isaiah Briscoe are tearing it up within their roles. Evan Fournier has stepped up his game and gotten out of his shooting funk (42.9 percent shooting from beyond the arc in his last eight games).

Everything is coming together at the right time. The Magic are peaking at the right moment and they are close enough to achieve their Playoff goals they essentially control their own destiny.

All the evidence has been there for the Magic. They are finally living up to their potential. They have put themselves in this solid position for a Playoff chase in the final quarter of the season.

Now they just have to confirm that belief.

So say it again. Speak it into existence.

The Orlando Magic are a Playoff team.