When the final quarter of the Orlando Magic’s season began back in mid-April, the team did not really know much about itself.
They were almost exactly three weeks removed from the trade that dramatically shifted the roster and preparing to face Nikola Vucevic for the first time in a Chicago Bulls uniform. They did not yet know the injuries that would further limit the roster down the stretch or the tanking strategy to try to set the team up for the next season.
Orlando played those final 18 games at a severe disadvantage — some for sure of its own doing. But it also played those final games with plenty of opportunities. Young players for the Magic were given more free reign by necessity and they had plenty of runway to take advantage of.
And plenty of positive vibes to leave for the offseason even in a dark year.
The Orlando Magic ended their season drifting toward the Lottery. Cole Anthony’s finishing flourish was one of the few bright spots pointing toward a better future.
No moment may have been more positive than Orlando’s last home win of the season. It was more than just the fact the Magic erased a 20-point deficit in the second half against a team desperate to win to stay in the playoff race.
It was the moment that came in the end. Perhaps the best moment of the post-trade deadline part of the season. The bright spot through all the losses.
With the Magic down by two points, they inbounded the ball to Cole Anthony. Whether the play was called for him or not, Anthony was determined to take the shot.
It is the kind of bravado that launched Anthony to the top of the high school rankings and made him a dynamic scorer at North Carolina. And even why the Magic felt fortunate to take him at No. 15 in the 2020 NBA Draft.
Anthony provided an iconic moment and an iconic walk-off interview to give Magic fans something to treasure.
With time ticking down, he crossed over Kyle Anderson a few times to create space for himself before pulling up for three. It went in and the fireworks started as R.J. Hampton congratulated him and the rest of the team swarmed him.
His postgame interview with Dante Marchitelli on Bally Sports Florida was pure emotion and confidence. It was downright refreshing.
That was just one moment though. A big one, but still a sign of the confidence and growth from the Magic’s rookie.
Orlando has a lot of optimism for Anthony to continue to improve. A lot of that is because of the way he finished his season, particularly after returning from a rib injury that knocked him out for the middle portions of the season.
Anthony was simply stellar in the final quarter of the season. And as a beacon of what this team could be as that young talent begins to coalesce, he is our pick for the MVP of the final quarter of the season.
In the final 18 games, Anthony averaged 15.8 points per game while shooting 42.9-percent from the floor and 38.7-percent from beyond the arc — for a 49.1-percent effective field goal percentage. He also averaged 4.3 assists per game as he showed more poise and patience as a playmaker.
Many of these moments and these games in the last quarter of the season were meaningless. There should be a lot of flares and alarms going off with all these stats.
Orlando Magic
Anthony scored a career-high 37 points on 10-for-25 shooting in the season finale against the Philadelphia 76ers. But nobody is taking much stock from that game. Ultimately, its results did not matter and both teams were not exactly trying to win.
Instead, the games that stood out were games that had some stakes to them. The moments where Anthony really made his presence felt.
It was that final moment against the Grizzlies that helped secure that win. It was the three big plays, including a tough layup over Kevin Love in the final moments to hold off a crazed rally from the Cleveland Cavaliers.
Anthony displayed toughness and grit. He was defiant — even telling off fans angry with him for trying to win games at the end of the season. That is exactly what the team wants to see from a young player.
Anthony said the time after his injury felt like his second season. He said he learned a lot in his time waiting on the sideline with the rib injury. He certainly played like it, playing with more poise and confidence. Once he got his shot back and his rhythm, he really began to shine.
That crystallized in those big moments in Magic wins.
But it was more than that. He showed remarkable consistency as his rookie season came to a close. In the final quarter of the season, he scored fewer than 10 points just twice. He scored fewer than 15 points only eight times in those final 18 games.
If the goal for any rookie is to get better as the season moves on, Anthony accomplished that with a stellar flourish.
A flourish that deserved a place on the All-Rookie team. A reward Anthony did not receive.
That will have to drive him through the offseason. If rookies make their biggest gains between their first and second seasons, Anthony already seems hard at work to make good on this omission.
This will have to do for now as an award.
The Magic had a terrible and rough season. Just about everything that could go wrong ended up going wrong for the team. And the franchise pulled the plug on the whole experiment in the end. They are starting over this year.
So now a big key to that process will be how this extremely young roster develops and grows. Hints of just what they can become were sprinkled throughout the end of the season.
None more than Anthony and his stellar run to finish the season. Just how good he can become remains unclear. But Anthony provided a necessary spark and a sign of hope in a dark season.
For that, the team has to be very excited.