{"id":418677,"date":"2026-10-04T20:12:33","date_gmt":"2026-10-04T20:12:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/418677\/"},"modified":"2026-10-04T20:12:33","modified_gmt":"2026-10-04T20:12:33","slug":"orlando-magic-updates-black-penda-return-to-practice","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/418677\/","title":{"rendered":"Orlando Magic updates: Black, Penda return to practice"},"content":{"rendered":"

After an off day Saturday, the Magic<\/a> returned to the practice courts inside the AdventHealth Training Center on Sunday morning and saw some depth return to action as well.<\/p>\n

Anthony Black<\/a> (sprained ankle) and Noah Penda<\/a> (hamstring) were both able to take part in practice and do more work as they continued to ramp up from minor injuries, Orlando<\/a> coach Sean Sweeney<\/a> said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey look good,\u201d Sweeney said after practice. \u201cHopefully they came out clean. Looks like they did. They both said they felt great, so (they\u2019re) working hard. It\u2019s good to see them out there.\u201d<\/p>\n

Just three days away from their first preseason game Wednesday at Memphis, the Magic focused primarily on execution in the half court during Sunday\u2019s practice, Sweeney said.<\/p>\n

Orlando will shift back to running up and down the full length of the court in practice Monday before Tuesday\u2019s session, which will feature a combination of both half-court and full-court work. Sweeney and his staff will then determine the distribution of minutes and lineup combinations in the preseason opener against the Grizzlies.<\/p>\n

Sweeney shared his approach to the preseason after practice Sunday.<\/p>\n

\u201cWell, I think the preseason is where you\u2019re trying to continue to build on your identity,\u201d he said. \u201cSo, competition is certainly important. (You\u2019re) being mindful of the different parameters that you may give guys in terms of minutes and stuff like that, but we still want to compete at the highest level we can.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe want to make sure we\u2019re working on being connected and then we want to develop our toughness throughout,\u201d Sweeney added. \u201cSo, just really drilling down on those things that we\u2019ve worked, and then not losing sight of the brand and the identity that we want to have.\u201d<\/p>\n

Magic guard Jalen Suggs wasn\u2019t seen on the court during the media-viewing session of practice but not because of an injury. Suggs was considered to be a little under the weather, the Orlando Sentinel was told.<\/p>\n

Bianchi: Shaq left, Dwight left, but Vooch came home! That matters to Magic fans<\/a><\/p>\n

Officials in attendance<\/p>\n

The Magic were joined by a handful of NBA officials<\/a> during Sunday\u2019s practice, including veteran referee Ed Malloy.<\/p>\n

The league recently shared points of emphasis<\/a> it wants its officials to focus on during the upcoming season, which included freedom of movement by players. The NBA wants offensive players to avoid pushing off of defenders with their non-dribbling arm and also not extend their arms with force while setting a screen.<\/p>\n

In addition, the league wants to make sure offensive players off the ball can move with the necessary space in the post and on the perimeter. The NBA also wants to see fouls called on contact made by defenders during straight-line pathway plays.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe way that we talked about it with the team is (that) there are certain things that the league is going to be concentrating on going into the year and we want to understand what that is,\u201d Sweeney said. \u201cFor us as coaches, that\u2019s why we teach certain techniques that we teach to be within the confines of the rules.<\/p>\n

\u201cHaving the officials here (Sunday), that helps reinforce those things and helps us understand maybe where we\u2019re not as good as we want to be, or \u2018Hey, you guys are doing this great, keep it up,’\u201d Sweeney added. \u201cBecause we want to play right up to that line and then if we cross it, come on back.\u201d<\/p>\n

Jason Beede can be reached at jbeede@orlandosentinel.com<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"After an off day Saturday, the Magic returned to the practice courts inside the AdventHealth Training Center on…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":418678,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[114,2295,139,141,1239,140,109,76046,110],"class_list":["post-418677","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-orlando","tag-latest-headlines","tag-nba","tag-orlando","tag-orlando-headlines","tag-orlando-magic","tag-orlando-news","tag-social","tag-social-sports","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/418677","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=418677"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/418677\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/418678"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=418677"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=418677"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=418677"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}