The Orlando Magic have missed the NBA Playoffs and Play-In Tournament altogether. There was no postseason basketball and the season ended with optimism a few weeks ago.
All in all the Magic had a successful season and the team cand hold its head high and look forward to their growth and development to come. But, in hindsight, Orlando missed many opportunities throughout the season that caused the team to miss the chance to fight for the postseason.
The Magic certainly can point to their 5-20 start and the injuries that led to it. The team did well to rally and go 29-28 the rest of the season. But still, the Magic never really got closer than three games to the final play-in spot.
It was good for this young team to talk about and focus on the postseason as a realistic goal. But the team never made the big move to put pressure on the teams ahead of them. And in the end, the Orlando Magic only climbed over the Indiana Pacers just before their eventual elimination from postseason contention.
The Magic still had quite a mountain to climb. And, as there are every season, there are losses that sting a bit more than normal. Opportunities lost that very realistically cost the team a chance to play into late April and maybe even some into early May.
This is not a season for regret. The Magic learned and gained a lot.
Still, looking back at these 10 missed opportunities will give the Magic an avenue on what to improve on next season.
10 losses the Orlando Magic will regret from 2023
10. Dec. 19 at Atlanta Hawks
The Orlando Magic were on their six-game winning streak that had revived their season.
But the Magic were not going to win out the rest of the season. That loss was going to come eventually. And everyone wondered how the Magic would react to losing again. Was this win streak a mirage or the start of something for the team?
None of it seemed to matter. Orlando just needed to stay in the moment and take it one game at a time. And when they faced that deficit and the potential to lose, it would be a true test of their character.
They showed that character in erasing a 12-point deficit with just more than three minutes to play on a Markelle Fultz lay-up.
But the team showed its youth in the end. On the Hawks’ final play, Paolo Banchero made a rookie mistake and fouled Dejounte Murray on a last-second jump shot to seal the game. Orlando could not get a shot off to try to retake the lead. Their win streak was over and an important lesson was learned.
The Magic fought and rallied and put themselves in a position to win this game and made a mistake and suffered a heartbreaking loss. Banchero individually learned from this game and moving forward will make himself a better defender. It will pay off in future close games.
9. Jan. 13 at Utah Jazz
Losing close games are never fun. However, losing on a last-second shot and failing on fundamental aspects of games down the stretch is what makes these losses even worse. Especially with a chance to get a win in a tough road environment while on a long road trip.
In a back-and-forth game down the stretch of the fourth quarter, the ball ended up with Collin Sexton at the free-throw line with 15.1 seconds with the Utah Jazz with a one-point lead.
Sexton missed both free throws but the Orlando Magic gave up the offensive rebound and allowed Walker Kessler to take and make two free throws. The Jazz would hold on to win the close game as some of the Magic’s rebounding troubles came to the front.
Utah had 17 offensive rebounds with Kessler grabbing seven on his own as Orlando struggled to secure the little plays necessary to win.
Giving up offensive rebounds on free throws, especially at the end of games, is inexcusable. Making these mistakes takes away your own opportunity to win games. Orlando has to take advantage of chances to win games if they want to take the next step as team.
This was yet another lesson for a young team and a game that slipped through Orlando’s fingers.
10 losses the Orlando Magic will regret from 2023
8. Nov. 7 vs. Houston Rockets
A good team takes care of business against bad teams. The Orlando Magic were not healthy to start off the season and it is important to acknowledge that fact.
But the Magic gave up 134 points to a bad Rockets team and gave up a ton of 3-pointers to one of the worst shooting teams in the entire league. This was a team looking for its identity and not finding it early in the season.
When the Magic look back at their results, they will certainly see this game as one of the biggest missed opportunities. They got hit with a bad night at the worst opportunity.
In a season that started poorly (2-8 record going into the game), Orlando needed to find a way to get a win to steady the ship and failed to and only allowed the season to continue and spiral out of control.
At this point, it felt like the Magic were certainly in for a very long season as they struggled to put the pieces together.
7. Nov. 27 vs. Philadelphia 76ers
Teams need to take advantage of opportunities. And they need to build off their success too.
The Orlando Magic have been depleted for the majority of the past few seasons and have been taken advantage of. But in a pair of games against the Philadelphia 76ers in November, the Orlando Magic failed to take advantage of their opponent being shorthanded.
Worse still, after a close loss in the first meeting, they found a way to lose by 30 to the 76ers without Joel Embiid, James Harden and Tyrese Maxey.
This was the low point of the season for sure. At this point, the Magic were so injury-depleted, it seemed difficult to know where to start with them. It was hard to find a way out until players got healthy.
Early on in the season, the Magic were struggling to find wins. This was a game Orlando had to take advantage of and could not. Instead, the Magic got blown out and was a big disappointment in a season where every win counted.
Fortunately, they got some relief soon in the form of some healthy bodies.
6. Dec. 28 at Detroit Pistons
Once again the Orlando Magic found themselves against a bad team in the Detroit Pistons without Cade Cunningham. Even on the second night of a back-to-back, this felt like a winnable game and the kind of game a postseason team takes care of one way or another.
Orlando continuously found themselves against teams at the right time and came up short. These were the chances the team could not get back.
Instead, the Magic were playing down to their competition and allowing a team at the bottom of the standings to have career games and standout performances. Orlando allowed Saddiq Bey (28 points) and Alec Burkes (31 points) to torch the team off the bench. These are all games that the Magic failed to win games they should have.
On top of that, this game was marred by a fight that started between Moe Wagner and Killian Hayes. That fight would claim nearly every player on the roster, forcing the league to spread out suspensions over two games. This was a loss that really resulted in three losses in the end.
10 losses the Orlando Magic will regret from 2023
5. March 14 at San Antonio Spurs
By this point in the season, this game against the San Antonio Spurs was a must-win game. The Spurs were clearly tanking at this point in the season in the hopes of the number one pick and the Magic were fighting to get into the Play-In Tournament.
But once again, Orlando played down to its competition and never really had the spark to stay in the game. The Spurs, even with many of their key players sitting out, hit a franchise-record 22 3-pointers.
Orlando got burned once again. In the NBA, players do not tank. Orlando played as if the team was going to be able to coast through this game. Instead, the team took a devastating loss.
Likely this was the loss that ended the Magic’s season in most fans’ eyes. It certainly made any serious conversation of a postseason push feel pretty distant.
4. Oct. 19 at Detroit Pistons
In the first game of the season, the Orlando Magic had a chance to start the year on the right foot. Anything can happen in a game, especially early on as teams are still getting on track, but habits start to build over time. And this was a chance to establish themselves as the young team to watch in the league.
The battle of the last two top picks was a statement game in many ways.
But the Magic did not come out on the right foot. They set many of their bad habits for the season in this first game. And it would cost the Magic dearly as the season progressed.
Orlando lost a double-digit lead and gave it up quickly. They let a poor-shooting team get hot from deep and climb back into the game. And then, in the end, they gave up a critical offensive rebound and a game-winning 3-pointer to put them at 0-1 to start the year.
The Magic could have gotten an early win on the season instead suffered a heartbreaking loss to start the season and got off to a 0-5 record. At least Paolo Banchero showed how good he would be for the team this season, scoring 29 points and starting his rookie year off right.
3. Feb. 11 vs. Miami Heat
A big growing measure for young teams is winning close games. A lot of the games on this list go through many of the Orlando Magic’s late-game failures.
No game this season probably hurt more or showed how far the team had to go late in games than this overtime loss to the Miami Heat.
The Magic held a seven-point lead in the fourth quarter with 2:22 remaining in the game. That should have been a sure win. Instead, Jimmy Butler got hot and the Magic got cold and they found themselves in overtime and feeling the weight of a close loss.
This was a crushing loss for Orlando as a team trying to continue to make up ground lost during the early part of the season. This was tracking to be a boost for the young team.
But too many turnovers late in a game in which Orlando led the entire game in a convincing fashion force the team to learn the hard way what it takes to close out a game.
The game would go into overtime where the Magic would continue to make mistakes and would ultimately come up short.
Learning how to close games is important and this game was an important experience for the Magic. But in hindsight, this was not a game Orlando was able to afford to lose.
Fortunately, Orlando learned its lesson a month later when the team again lost a late lead to Miami at Amway Center and rallied in overtime to get a critical win.
2. Nov. 1 at Oklahoma City Thunder
The inability to control big leads was apparent at the start of the season. The Orlando Magic had a double-digit lead in the fourth quarter on the road against another up-and-coming team and had another chance to close a game they needed to win to get the young season back on track.
This could have been a major confidence builder. Instead, it became a bitter disappointment and yet another sign this could be another long season.
Once the Oklahoma City Thunder upped the pressure on the Orlando Magic’s point guard-less lineups, the Magic started to wilt.
Orlando quickly staggered on offense and could not stop Oklahoma City in any capacity. The Magic quickly found themselves playing catch up.
This game illustrated Orlando needed a point guard to stabilize the offense would come soon enough.
Ultimately, the Magic would look back on another game they should have won and would have helped down the stretch of the season.
10 losses the Orlando Magic will regret from 2023
1. Nov. 5 vs. Sacramento Kings
This was the game. This was supposed to be the game to turn around the season.
Coming off a big win against the Golden State Warriors in the previous game in which the Orlando Magic closed the game on both ends of the court seemingly unlocking a bit of the potential this team had.
They were facing a team that was struggling itself. The Sacramento Kings had gotten off to a slow start and had only gotten their first win a few nights before against the Miami Heat. This was a game that could turn the season for both teams.
Someone was going to get the boost. And it sure looked like it would be the Magic on their home court.
Orlando was up 20 points in the second half and it seemed as if there was still time to turn the season around. That was not the case. This was not the Magic’s moment. Not yet at least.
As Orlando did everything right in the first half, the team did everything wrong in the second half. Orlando surrendered another lead and found itself playing catch-up in the fourth quarter and in overtime.
Orlando lost itself again and scrambled to get to overtime. The team then scrambled late with a clutch steal and basket to tie the game. It seemed the game was destined for double overtime. Still a shot to win.
Instead, De’Aaron Fox hit a half-court buzzer-beater to give the Kings the win. It was a turning point for the Kings as they became artists late in games throughout the season and eventually the 3-seed in the Western Conference.
The team only found more questions that had to be answered the rest of the season.
This was one of the games the team absolutely regretted. A game that ultimately cost the Magic a chance at making the postseason.