{"id":148285,"date":"2026-02-08T20:39:08","date_gmt":"2026-02-08T20:39:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/148285\/"},"modified":"2026-02-08T20:39:08","modified_gmt":"2026-02-08T20:39:08","slug":"orlando-magic-to-host-bucks-twice-before-nba-all-star-break","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/148285\/","title":{"rendered":"Orlando Magic to host Bucks twice before NBA All-Star break"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Jazz<\/a> outscored the Magic<\/a> 35-21 in the second quarter of Saturday\u2019s game at Kia Center<\/a> to take an 11-point lead into the half.<\/p>\n

Utah<\/a>, who saw three-time All-Defensive center Jaren Jackson Jr.<\/a> make his debut for the team after he was traded from Memphis, didn\u2019t slow down from there when its lead increased to 17 points with 1:49 left in the third quarter.<\/p>\n

But something peculiar took place next.<\/p>\n

After Orlando<\/a> ended the third frame on a 10-0 run to cut its deficit to single digits, Jazz coach Will Hardy benched the majority of his starting lineup, including Jackson Jr., who notched 22 points in 25 minutes, and Lauri Markkanen, who led all scorers with 27.<\/p>\n

Facing mostly backups in the fourth quarter, Jamahl Mosley<\/a>\u2018s squad won 120-117 against a Jazz squad that recorded its 37th loss of the season.<\/p>\n

What happened?<\/p>\n

\u201cThey definitely handed us that win,\u201d Magic forward Paolo Banchero<\/a> told the Orlando Sentinel<\/a> in the locker room after the three-point win. \u201cBut a win\u2019s a win.\u201d<\/p>\n

To Banchero\u2019s point, while Orlando certainly made efforts to win \u2014 back-to-back 3s from Moe Wagner<\/a> and Tristan da Silva<\/a> sparked a key stretch late in the third \u2014 the Jazz (16-37) made sure to lose.<\/p>\n

Trailing the Magic by three points with 8.7 seconds remaining in the game after Jalen Suggs<\/a> sank a pair of free throws, Utah decided against calling its final timeout in order to draw up a set play. Instead, the Jazz brought the ball down the court and reserve guard Isaiah Collier missed a long-range shot in the closing moments.<\/p>\n

While Utah needed the loss in order to help secure better positioning in June\u2019s NBA draft, Orlando needed the win just as badly to help remain afloat in the Eastern Conference playoff race.<\/p>\n

And ultimately, regular-season wins all count the same regardless of the details.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ll always take a win, obviously,\u201d da Silva told the Sentinel. \u201cIt\u2019s a good way we kind of crawled back into the game.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou also saw the lineups that they put out there, so there\u2019s still a lot of stuff that we can look at [from] this game and see what we can get better [at] to make sure that we also have those types of performances against the primary lineups of teams,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

Specifically in the second quarter, the Jazz scored 22 points in the paint, outrebounded Orlando 19-8 and limited the Magic to 1-for-11 from 3-point range.<\/p>\n

Utah outscored Orlando 14-4 across the final five minutes of the first half while scoring 11 fastbreak points in the quarter.<\/p>\n

\u201cI thought we just were a little undisciplined getting back in transition, giving up some cuts and stuff like that,\u201d Banchero said about the second frame. \u201c[The Jazz] do a good job moving the ball and making the defense rotate with some creative stuff on offense.\u201d<\/p>\n

Knowing it can play better regardless of who\u2019s on the floor, Orlando was still without Franz Wagner<\/a>, who missed his ninth game in a row due to left high ankle sprain injury management.<\/p>\n

He initially missed 16 contests (Dec. 9-Jan. 11) due to the original sprain and previously said he \u201cprobably wasn\u2019t ready\u201d to play<\/a> two games during the team\u2019s January trip to Europe, which led to lingering soreness and an extended rehab.<\/p>\n

Prior to tip-off Saturday, Wagner said he\u2019s progressing well. After the trade deadline on Thursday, Magic president of basketball operations Jeff Weltman<\/a> said Wagner was \u201cvery close\u201d<\/a> to returning.<\/p>\n

But with only two games remaining for the Magic until NBA All-Star Weekend, time is running out for Wagner to see the court before the league break.<\/p>\n

\u201cYeah, that\u2019s my hope, for sure,\u201d Wagner said when asked by the Sentinel about a potential return before the All-Star break.<\/p>\n

The Magic forward said he went through two good workouts the past two gamedays on Saturday and Thursday, and he and the team are monitoring how the injury responds to those sessions.<\/p>\n

Neither side wants to make the same mistake as last time when Wagner first tried to return.<\/p>\n

\u201cChecking all of the boxes of the movements that I\u2019ve got do in a game,\u201d Wagner said when asked what he\u2019s looking for to make sure he feels OK to make the next step to return. \u201cAnd then being OK with a little bit of pain but obviously gauging [it].<\/p>\n

\u201cIt should never be too much and shouldn\u2019t get worse after a workout the rest of the day,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

Orlando\u2019s last two games before the break are both against the Bucks, who held onto former Magic guard Gary Harris past the trade deadline but sent Cole Anthony to Phoenix.<\/p>\n

The Magic (27-24) have won four of their last six games and Milwaukee (21-29) enters on a three-game winning streak.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe haven\u2019t played our best basketball, probably,\u201d Magic big man Moe Wagner said. \u201cThere\u2019s plenty of reasons for that. But the beautiful thing about the league is that you have 82 games; you don\u2019t just have 30. There\u2019s plenty of NBA teams in the past that haven\u2019t had that season they were expected to have and kind of turned it around toward the end. And that\u2019s the mindset.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s on us players to kind of come up with that because we\u2019re out there,\u201d he added. \u201cEverybody\u2019s got to kind of make a decision whether we come to work, do our routine and do that with the right mindset and then come to the game and see if the result works out, or if we just kind of put our heads down and somewhat \u2014 I don\u2019t know how do you want to call it \u2014 but like surrender to the circumstances. After the All-Star break, after we kind of rejuvenate our mind a little bit and re-charge, we will not surrender.\u201d<\/p>\n

Jason Beede can be reached at jbeede@orlandosentinel.com<\/a><\/p>\n

Up next \u2026<\/p>\n

Magic vs. Bucks<\/p>\n

When:\u00a07:30 p.m., Monday, Kia Center<\/p>\n

TV:\u00a0Peacock<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Jazz outscored the Magic 35-21 in the second quarter of Saturday\u2019s game at Kia Center to take…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":148286,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[114,2295,139,141,1239,140,109,110],"class_list":{"0":"post-148285","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-orlando","8":"tag-latest-headlines","9":"tag-nba","10":"tag-orlando","11":"tag-orlando-headlines","12":"tag-orlando-magic","13":"tag-orlando-news","14":"tag-social","15":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/148285","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=148285"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/148285\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/148286"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=148285"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=148285"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=148285"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}