Orlando Magic, American professional basketball team based in Orlando, Florida, that plays in the Eastern Conference of the National Basketball Association (NBA). The Magic have won two Eastern Conference titles (1995, 2009).
The franchise, along with the Minnesota Timberwolves, joined the NBA as an expansion team in the 1989–90 season. During its first three years the Magic’s play was mediocre and the team posted losing records, but the Magic began a remarkably quick turnaround when it selected centre Shaquille O’Neal with the first overall pick of the 1992 NBA draft. Led by O’Neal, the Magic added 20 wins to its previous year’s total in his first season to finish with a 41–41 record and a tie for the last playoff position in the Eastern Conference, which it lost in a tiebreaker with the Indiana Pacers. The lost tiebreaker proved fortuitous, for it placed the Magic in the 1993 draft lottery, which the Magic won despite having only a 1.5 percent chance of attaining the first overall draft choice. The team traded the player it selected, Chris Webber, for the third selection, point guard Anfernee (“Penny”) Hardaway, and future draft picks.
The young Magic team qualified for its first playoff berth in the 1993–94 season, an accomplishment it bettered in 1994–95 by advancing to the NBA finals in its sixth year of existence. The Magic were swept by the Houston Rockets in four games, but the team’s future nevertheless seemed bright. At the end of the 1995–96 season, however, O’Neal moved to the Los Angeles Lakers after signing the largest free-agent contract in NBA history, and Orlando was left without its marquee player. The Magic entered into a period of regular-season success followed by losses in the first round of the postseason, during which the franchise traded away the injury-plagued Hardaway in 1999.
Orlando sank to the worst record in the league in 2003–04, but the team again won the draft lottery at the end of the season. The Magic used its selection to draft high-school centre Dwight Howard, who provided the low-post dominance the team had lacked since O’Neal’s departure, and the Magic began another turnaround. The Magic added free-agent forwards Hedo Turkoglu and Rashard Lewis, and the team reached the second round of the playoffs in 2007–08. Behind the exceptional play of the star trio, the Magic once again advanced to the NBA finals during the 2008–09 season, where it lost to the Lakers in five games. Turkoglu left the team the following off-season, but the Magic had another strong campaign in 2009–10 before ultimately losing to the Boston Celtics in the Eastern Conference finals. Howard began to openly agitate for a trade during the 2011–12 season, and he was ultimately dealt to the Lakers in August 2012. The rebuilding Magic then posted the worst record in the NBA (20–62) in 2012–13, which was the first of five consecutive last-place finishes in the divisional standings for the beleaguered franchise. In 2018–19 new head coach Steve Clifford guided the Magic to a surprising division title and a first-round postseason loss. The team repeated that playoff result in 2019–20, but an injury-riddled 2020–21 season saw the team trade away many of its major contributors and finish with the third worst record in the NBA, leading the franchise and Clifford to part ways at season’s end.