The Orlando Magic know they can compete with the Cleveland Cavaliers. They saw it in last year's playoff series. Or at least they think it.
That postseason is a long time ago in the basketball calendar. They are nearing the final quarter of their frustrating 2025 season. They have watched the Cavaliers turn their Game 7 win and trip to the second round into a dominant offense that is taking the league by storm and putting them on track to compete for the NBA title.
The Magic? They tried to address one of their biggest weaknesses this offseason and depended on internal development as the Cavs did. But injuries to their best players derailed their rhythm.
Maybe it was already lost. The Cavaliers were a tough team to begin with because of their ability to spread the floor with several 3-point specialists, maybe they just needed an offensive-minded coach to give them the green light and confidence.
Shooting ultimately gives a team confidence. It gives them space. It is the great equalizer.
The Magic are always running uphill. This season has been defined by the injuries that took out their best players. But it has also been defined by a historically bad shooting season. Certainly in the modern era.
Orlando not only cannot keep up with teams like Cleveland when the team fires away from three, it does not have the confidence even to come close.
That led once again to an embarrassing 122-82 defeat at Kia Center to the Cleveland Cavaliers. The Magic never had a chance.
"There is no rhyme or reason, we got our butts kicked," coach Jamahl Mosley said after Tuesday's loss. "You give Cleveland a ton of credit for how they're playing and what they're doing. We didn't play our style of basketball. We'll look at it, we'll practice hard tomorrow and get back to work. That's what we know and that's what's going to help us figure out some of these lulls and some of these situations. And we'll go from there."
Hesitation is death
From the first play of the game, the Cleveland Cavaliers started firing from three. Max Strus hit two threes to open the game. De'Andre Hunter broke the game open with three straight triples to extend a one-point lead to 10.
The Cavaliers hit 19 of 32 threes, marking a season-high for opponent makes against the Magic. Strus went 5 for 7. Hunter went 4 for 5. They just kept firing and making.
The Orlando Magic do not have answers. And their inability to score and keep up is what costs them the most important thing of all.
Confidence and trust.
"We have to get all on the same page, whether it's offensively or defensively," Cole Anthony said after Tuesday's loss. "I think we have to have as a team and as a unit, we have to have an understanding with each other that we're all locked in and all moving on one string. We do it at times. Sometimes there will be some mental lapses or things are not going our way. We have to stay consistent with it."
The Magic ended the game shooting 5 for 28 (17.9 percent). Even if they had shot their average or even the league average, it would have been difficult to keep up with the Cavaliers. It is simply a math equation that the Magic do not have enough offensive push.
But as those shots stopped falling, the team gets tighter and the ball sticks. Playmakers like Paolo Banchero and Franz Wagner become hesitant to move the ball. Even when they do, players can be hesitant to shoot.
That hesitation is death. That is what costs the team quality looks and allows
Without the shooting element, they quickly lost confidence and abandoned what worked. They abandoned their identity.
With frustration mounting, their defense got loose. They got beat to 50/50 balls and were late to challenge threes.
Shooting creates confidence
The Cleveland Cavaliers, now winners of eight straight and 12 of their last 13, are a good team and playing well. It would have been a tall order for the Orlando Magic to beat them even if they had played better.
But the way the Magic lost to these elite teams continues to show how far they are from contention. It continues to show the element they are missing so desperately:
The confidence that comes from shooting.
The Cavaliers have it. They get it from several players. They feel it spread around and improve their vibes.
Their best players—whether it is Donovan Mitchell or Darius Garland (who sat out the game with a hip injury) or Ty Jerome (20 points, 4-for-6 shooting) off the bench. They know they will get shooting from everyone.
The Magic fell short of their defensive identity as much as they struggled to shoot from the perimeter.
"You know coming in that they're a high-powered offense," Paolo Banchero said after Tuesday's loss. "They shoot a lot of threes. They have a lot of shooters. So it's not like we didn't know who is out there on the floor. They just outplayed us."
Right now, the Magic get shooting from no one. And the lack of confidence in their shooting—the most basic act in the game—spreads to everyone. You can see it in the hesitance to pass and move the ball. The Magic cannot function offensively because they do not believe in their shooting.
Not enough at least.
Moving on
The Orlando Magic have won plenty with minimal shooting. The team is 16-6 when it shoots only 33.0 percent from three. All the Magic have to do is make one of every three 3-pointer and they will give themselves a chance to win.
But nothing matters against elite teams if they cannot keep up with their shooting. This leads to many other problems, cascading problems that only make their hole deeper and slow down the offense. The team was not on the same page.
"We know what our identity is," Jamahl Mosley said after Tuesday's loss. "It's defensively, and that was not tonight. They get a ton of credit for how they played and what they are doing and how they are playing. They are leading the league in a lot of categories and 3-pointers are one of them. Our ability to defend that better and know who we're guarding and what we're doing in those situations has to do with us getting back to our body of work and how we need to do it and approach it the right way."
Paolo Banchero is correct to say shooting is not the only reason the Magic got run out of the gym. The Magic lost its trademark physicality and got caught on its back foot. They could not control the tempo and fell behind 8-0 from the start and trailed by more than 20 in the first quarter. It was too hard to climb out.
But shooting is a disease that spreads to everything else. The poor shooting leads to hesitant offense and leads to defensive breakdowns and frustration.
Ultimately the Magic are the only ones who can change this story.
"We have to challenge each other," Banchero said after Tuesday's loss. "Guys have to be pissed off by this. Everyone needs to be pissed of by this. It's got to change. We can't just keep saying it. Something has to change."
That has been the story for the season. And the Magic and their vibes will not return until the confidence and ability to shoot, in whatever limited form this team has, returns.
The Magic know something after this game, they are not on the same level as the Cavs. And that is a disappointing fact.