Magic's Season-Opening 26 Games Loaded with Road Tests and Importance

The Orlando Magic's slate of 82 games features a road-heavy stretch that could challenge head coach Jamahl Mosley's team out of the gate. For a team that was in the NBA's bottom half in road winning percentage a season ago, finding success away from Orlando will be crucial early.

Orlando Magic coach Jamahl Mosley calls a play in the second quarter against the Milwaukee Bucks at Fiserv Forum. / Benny Sieu-Imagn Images

ORLANDO, Fla. — Every now and then, there's a phenomenon in the NBA when a team given the label of being in "rebuild mode" can catch the rest of their competitors off-guard with an ahead-of-schedule season. The Orlando Magic certainly fit that bill a year ago.

Orlando, which hadn't threatened making the playoffs in some time and was still viewed as a young core with potential, let its play do the talking instead. The Magic opened the season by going 13-5 through the end of November and improved to as many as nine games above .500 through the first 23 games of the year.

All of a sudden, sitting at 16-7, there was that "rebuilding" Magic team, firmly in the playoff picture over a quarter into the season.

Not only did it validate the Magic's efforts to emerge back into contention, but it provided a cushion that kept Orlando afloat when it took its lumps over the next month and a half – a stretch that saw the Magic go 9-16 over a 25-game stretch and arrive at 25-23 when the calendar flipped to February.

History tells us that Orlando finished the season by winning 22 of 34 games and finishing with the East's fifth seed, playing postseason basketball for the first time in four years. But the East was tightly contested — just four games split the second-seeded New York Knicks and eighth-seeded Miami Heat — in a jumbled race to the finish. In Orlando's case, it avoided the Play-In tournament by owning tiebreakers over the Indiana Pacers and Philadelphia 76ers, who each also finished the year with 47 wins.

Nearly every NBA team experiences highs and lows throughout an 82-game season. But for Orlando to come out of the gate strong, it was something a young team built off of grew from. Rallying together to finish the season on a high note, every single one of those early wins counted toward earning a guaranteed spot in the East's top-six playoff teams.

The Magic won't be sneaking up on anyone this year, however, and they don't plan on it. Rather, Orlando is puffing its chest and preparing itself to land a seed it feels it deserves near the top of the East. Offseason acquisitions and chatter coming from players suggest the Magic wants to find itself in contention with the East elites for years to come.

Their schedule for the season ahead will ask them to prove it from the get-go.

Of Orlando's first 26 games to begin the regular season, just 10 will be played in the Magic's home Kia Center. Compared to last season, the Magic got 13 of the games in the 16-7 stretch to open the year on its home floor.

Cleveland Cavaliers guard Donovan Mitchell (45) goes for a loose ball against Orlando Magic guard Jalen Suggs (4) during the first half in game seven of the first round for the 2024 NBA playoffs at Rocket Mortgage FieldHouse. / Ken Blaze-Imagn Images

The Magic went 29-12 at home a season ago — good for the sixth-best home record all year across the NBA — but finished in the league's bottom half in road winning percentage. It's not uncommon for road struggles to come for young teams, and the same held true for the Magic; especially in the aforementioned 9-16 stretch through the middle portion of the year, where Orlando went 5-11 over the 16 road games in that 23-game span.

Further, the road team didn't win a single game in the seven-game postseason series between the Cleveland Cavaliers and the Magic. If just one or two results are different and Orlando is hosting the series to begin instead of Cleveland, the outcome could've varied from what ultimately happened, with the Cavs winning Game 7 at home to close out the first-round series.

This time around though, in 2024-25, there is no home-loaded slate that can ease them in. From Oct. 23 to Dec. 8, Orlando will embark on two separate five-game road trips and knock out one of their two west coast trips. One-offs at Miami on opening night and later trips to Memphis and Charlotte are close enough to not be too straining travel-wise, but Memphis comes on the second night of their first back-to-back and Charlotte is sandwiched between two Thanksgiving-week home games. Three of the five away-away back-to-backs come in the season's first month and a half, too.

A week in the Northeast concludes the chunk of games, with two games in Brooklyn, one in New York and two more in Philadelphia. Only then, when mid-December rolls around and a third of the season is over with, can the Magic catch their breath and unpack their bags a bit.

The test then presented to the Magic is one of early attrition. Can Orlando, who wasn't the only team to improve of its immediate surrounding competition, find enough success in the early portion of the schedule to inspire the confidence and fight required to be considered among the East's best teams?

Although the conference pales in comparison to the West top-to-bottom, Orlando's fighting in a top-heavy conference with favorites to go far in the season ahead. How many wins would be enough to secure standing in the top-6 and avoid the Play-In? Although early preseason projections show there figures to only be seven or eight teams who factor into the playoff picture, every team in consideration would likely opt for the security and time off that comes with avoiding having to earn a spot in the top eight beyond the 82-game regular season schedule.

After enduring the 16-of-26 road start, Orlando will play more home games than road games in three of the next four months – 29 home to 22 away from December through March.

In that lies the possible upside of playing away from home so much to begin the year: if the Magic can handle business or, at the very least, not find itself buried near the bottom of the East in the early going, they can then benefit from home court favoring them in the middle-to-latter stages of the year. When fighting for playoff seeding, every single aspect that can benefit Orlando helps.

In the NBA, that means sleeping in your own bed, getting to practice and work out the kinks in your own facility and finding an easier balance at home. Comfort on the road is a trait the NBA's most elite teams often carry, but it's imperative that teams serious about their success defend home floor first.

So while Orlando will be asked to take care of business as visitors early and often to begin the year, the opportunity to find their groove at home with their mettle tested lies on the table directly in front of them.

For a conference that shapes up to be a dogfight near the top, and Orlando looking to bark as much as anyone, any little bit will help.

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