What: Charlotte Hornets (13-38) (4-18 away) at Orlando Magic (26-29) (16-10 home)
When: 7:00pm Eastern
Where: Kia Center; Orlando, FL
How to watch: FanDuel Sports Network, NBA League Pass
Outfitting: Hornets–Icon (teal), Magic–City (gray…I think (they’re really cool though))
Game Lines: Hornets +12.5, Hornets money line +475, O/U 202.5
Injuries:
Hornets: Jusuf Nurkic-in (trade that the team didn’t back out of), Isaiah Wong-probable (foot), Moussa Diabate-questionable (eye), LaMelo Ball-out (ankle), Mark Williams-out (trade stuff), Josh Okogie-out (hamstring), Brandon Miller-out (wrist), Tre Mann-out (back), Grant Williams-out (knee)
Magic: Jalen Suggs-doubtful (quad), Mo Wagner-out (knee)
The Magic came into the 2024-25 season thinking they were going to build off last season’s playoff run and competitive series against the Cavs. For a while, that looked like it was happening. Even without Paolo Banchero, they had a few weeks long stretch where they went 12-1 and looked to be a solid playoff team. Things started to falter in December, and the bottom completely fell out in January.
Since January 9th, the Magic are 4-13. Only the Wizards and Jazz have been worse. Their offense, which has always been a bit of a drag, has been the worst in the league in that span. The defense that has been their calling card is only average. It’s made for the second worst net rating in the league, and the worst net rating in the league if you don’t count the Wizards as an NBA team.
Part of the problem has been their inability to make threes, which is a scary thing to write. Feels like I’m setting up for the Magic to drop 20 threes on the Hornets heads. Anyway, during this stretch I’ve been referring to, Orlando has averaged fewer than 10 threes made per game, the only team in the league to accomplish such a feat. They’ve done so on 29.2% shooting from deep. They’re also not generating a lot of assists. In short, their offense is broken.
The Hornets offense is also broken, largely because most of their good offensive players aren’t playing. That sets us up with a matchup between two teams playing average defense and atrocious. Explains why the over/under looks like it belongs in 1998.
