Hornets learn valuable lessons in loss to Magic. How they respond will be key
In a moment that Nostradamus probably could appreciate, following the morning shootaround, Charles Lee offered insight into the type of challenge the Orlando Magic posed.
“The theme of their team is, how do you get to the paint, how do you play tough and physical?” the Charlotte Hornets coach said. “So, it’s going to be important for our guys to understand their tendencies and try to hopefully protect the paint as a collective unit.”
Never happened, though, and as a result, the NBA’s longest playoff drought extends to a full decade.
Unable to match the physicality of the home team from the opening tip, the Hornets were in a hole within a couple of blinks and never got it going in a 121-90 loss at Kia Center on Friday night.
Ending the season with a thud, especially after the emotional rollercoaster ride of Tuesday’s overtime victory over the Miami Heat, has to hurt. The trick now is for the Hornets to learn from this experience.
“You’re one step away from being in the playoffs, so I don’t want to discredit that,” Lee said, “but this has got to hurt a little bit. And you’ve got to think about this offseason. When you’re in the weight room, when you’re on the court. What am I going to do to go that extra mile to get even better, because we had a ton of growth this year.
“I don’t want those guys to lose sight of the positives that they did do. I think that the resilience of the team, the competitiveness, the togetherness continue to grow. And we earned an opportunity to be right there. So, ton of good, but that was not our best effort”
Which is why the Hornets can’t have amnesia and must remember how it felt to get virtually punched in the mouth from the outset. Shots that left them staggering and dazed to the point where they essentially were never in it, only mustering a one-point edge in the early going before falling behind by as many as 35 — to a team that reportedly had some infighting going on, leading to rumors that Orlando coach Jahmal Mosley will be out of a job whenever the curtain closes on the Magic’s season.
LaMelo Ball was battered around, collecting three fouls that forced him to take a seat with more than seven minutes remaining in the first half. That foul trouble led to the Hornets’ star point guard mustering only two points on six shots through two quarters.
“We knew that they were going to be real physical,” Ball said. “So, we’re telling all our teammates, players and everything, be physical.”
Instead, the Hornets couldn’t even muster clean screens against Orlando.
Six offensive fouls were whistled on Charlotte for illegal screens, with the bulk transpiring in the first half. During the first 15:15, the crew of Marc Davis, Sean Wright and Justin Van Duyne called five illegal screens on the Hornets.
“I think that’s just us fighting off physicality,” Brandon Miller said. “I feel like we’ve been guarded physical. I think we do a great job of screening at times just to try to get a defender off of one of our handlers or one of our creators. So, just having that in our mind through next year, just kind of be calm with the screening. That and then the patience by the ball-handlers.
“Everybody plays a part in screening — the ball-handler, the screener, communication between everybody on the court. So, just having that in our mind going into next season will be fine.”
Lee suggested the officiating didn’t make it easy.
“I thought that we actually hung in there with the physicality,” Lee said. “It was interesting trying to figure out the whistles. I thought there was a ton of physicality, and then all of a sudden we tried to set a screen to get a teammate open, and then we got called for one.
“So it was hard. I almost think it softened up our guys a little bit to figure out how do I actually get open if we’re not allowed to screen for one another?”
Either way it’s dissected, the Hornets were just doomed by inability to handle Orlando’s force. And in order to take that leap into becoming a team in the actual Eastern Conference playoff field, that must be rectified in some capacity.
It’ll be up to the Hornets to figure out what that improvement looks like and how they get there. But in facing some of the NBA’s upper echelon, such as the team they would have played if they advanced — the Detroit Pistons — it’s crystal-clear they have to solve that issue.
“It obviously hurt a lot,” Ball said, “but I feel like it’s all just learning lessons. You live, you learn, you evolve, and you move on.”
Which is why Lee wants them to stay focused on the bigger picture.
“Let this fuel you,” Lee said. “But also don’t take for granted the fact that you guys earned a ton of respect from everyone throughout the league with how hard you played, how well you played. And I think that they also helped build another stepping stone for this organization.”
This story was originally published April 18, 2026 at 12:07 AM.
