What: Charlotte Hornets (18-58) (10-28 home) vs Orlando Magic (45-31) (18-19 away)
When: 7:00 pm Eastern
Where: Spectrum Center; Charlotte, NC
How to watch: Bally Sports Southeast, NBA League Pass
Outfitting: Hornets–Icon (teal), Magic–Icon (black)
Game Lines: Hornets +11.6, O/U 206.5
Injuries:
Hornets: Miles Bridges-probable (wrist), Brandon Miller-probable (wrist), Grant Williams (ankle), Vasilije Micic-probable (shoulder), Nick Richards-questionable (foot), Amari Bailey-doubtful (illness), LaMelo Ball-out (ankle), Cody Martin-out (ankle), Seth Curry-out (ankle), Mark Williams-out (back)
Magic: Caleb Houstan-questionable (ankle)
At this point, the six full time Hornets that don’t have an injury designation have to be knocking on wood everywhere they go. They injury bug is trying to strike everyone on the Hornets, who are hogging all of them from teams like the Magic, who are barely hurt.
The Magic are peaking at the right time. They’re 7-3 in their last ten and have an outside shot of climbing as high as the two seed if the Bucks and Cavs keep losing. They don’t play pretty basketball, but they play winning basketball. They have a somewhat slow-paced mediocre offense, but they make up for that with super active, disruptive defense.
That defense has given the Hornets all sorts of problems. In two meetings with the Magic in March, the Hornets scored 89 and 92 points. They have almost as many turnovers (36) as they do assists (38) in those two games. The Magic muck up their off ball action and entice the Hornets to play one on one ball, which they’re bad at.
It’s hard to see this game going any differently. the Magic are playing good ball and the Hornets are…not. Over half the team is hurt, and it’s a bad match-up for them anyway.
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