It was 713 days ago that the Sixers fell short in a Game 6 loss to the New York Knicks, ending their 2023-24 season on their home floor and in heartbreaking fashion.

On Wednesday, for the first time since that night, the Sixers will compete in a postseason game. They are not yet officially a playoff team, but they will become one if they take care of business at home against the Orlando Magic.

The Sixers have a challenging path ahead of them to make noise in the Eastern Conference, and that was already the case before Joel Embiid's appendicitis diagnosis. With the former NBA MVP sidelined indefinitely, making a spirited playoff push will be an even tougher uphill battle for the Sixers. The journey starts with their Play-In Tournament battle against Orlando, in which the winner will face the Boston Celtics in a seven-game first-round series.

For three days, the Sixers have been dialed in on Orlando, a team they have not faced off with since January. Much like the Sixers, the Magic have an intriguing roster on paper, recently cashed in many assets to accelerate their timeline for championship contention, and have not played at a level that reflects the sum of their parts.

From Orlando's cornerstone players to its likely bench pieces, injury news, lineup data and much more, here is everything worth knowing about the Magic heading into Wednesday's game:

Best players, key statistics

Orlando is built around, as Sixers head coach Nick Nurse put it on Sunday, "[b]ig wings and aggressive guards."

Beginning with the big wings: Paolo Banchero, the top overall pick in the 2022 NBA Draft, is the head of the snake. A bruising forward listed at 6-foot-10 and 250 pounds, Banchero is a suspect jump-shooter but is one of the highest-volume shot-takers in the entire NBA. Banchero attempted 16.0 shots per game this year – down from 19.8 last season – and more than 75 percent of those shots came inside the arc. His overall efficiency was a bit below the league's average.

Banchero can certainly bully his way to the rim, and his free-throw volume was significant this season (8.2 attempts per game). But for someone whose shooting is a work in progress, he takes tons of mid-range jumpers.  If the Sixers have Banchero settling for contested pull-ups and not getting downhill and drawing fouls, they will be better off. Banchero also averaged 8.4 rebounds and 5.2 assists per game this season.

Franz Wagner, meanwhile, is a much more efficient offensive player, and a superior playmaker. Listed at 6-foot-10 and 220 pounds, Wagner averaged 20.6 points, 5.2 rebounds and 3.3 assists per game this season, but only logged 34 appearances. An ankle injury has derailed much of his fifth NBA season after he appeared in the first 24 games of the season. At his best, he is a three-level scorer with significant craft and playmaking chops. He is perhaps less of a known commodity than Banchero, but he is more of a multi-faceted threat.

Playing behind those wings is Wendell Carter Jr., a jack-of-all-trades big with no discernible weaknesses but not many outlier strengths. Carter is not a tremendous play finisher, but he is definitely a good one. He is not a high-caliber floor spacer, but for a center he is decent as a three-point shooter. His rebounding and passing are not elite, but they are good. He is not a shot-blocker, but he has been an important part of excellent NBA defenses. He is steady.

Then there are the aggressive guards. The heart and soul of this Magic team is Jalen Suggs in many ways. He is one of the best guard defenders in the entire NBA, a total pest on that end who will almost certainly open Wednesday's game defending Tyrese Maxey. Suggs has taken some steps forward on offense; he is more than a viable starting point guard even if he will never post gaudy season-long averages.

Suggs' backcourt mate is Desmond Bane, one of the league's elite three-point shooters. Orlando traded four first-round picks to land Bane from Memphis, hoping he would transform their troubled offense. Bane played all 82 games and was outstanding – 20.1 points, 4.1 rebounds and 4.1 assists per game while shooting 39.1 percent from beyond the arc – and his toughness and defensive aptitude made him a natural fit for Orlando.

The Magic spent years building an identity around their defense and physicality, and while Bane has not been responsible for subtracting from that, the Magic regressed from one of the league's elite defenses to a middle-of-the-pack unit on that end of the floor. Orlando finished the season 18th in offensive efficiency and 13th in defensive efficiency.

Season series

The Sixers won their season series with Orlando, 2-1, but that would not be easy to glean from how players spoke about the Magic after Sunday's regular-season finale. The Sixers had an emphatic home win over Orlando in the third game of the season back in October, playing without Embiid. They went to Orlando in January and secured the tiebreaker advantage, which ended up gifting them home-court advantage for Wednesday's game, though Suggs and Wagner were both sidelined. In between those victories, however, was an embarrassing 41-point loss in Philadelphia on Nov. 25. The Sixers did not have Embiid or Paul George that night, but Orlando was without Banchero and still bludgeoned the Sixers.

"They had our number," Andre Drummond said on Sunday. "I think we're in a different position now than we were then. The attention to detail is there, and we know what's at stake. I think we're prepared for what's to come."

Despite Orlando's litany of strong guard defenders, Maxey had his way with the Magic this season, averaging 30.7 points across those three meetings, including a 43-point gem back in October. VJ Edgecombe scored 26 points that night, too, though he only scored six points in his other appearance against Orlando.

In 76 minutes against the Sixers this season – that is fitting – Banchero shot 16-for-36 from the field, 1-for-7 from three-point range and 13-for-13 on free throws, with 12 assists to six turnovers.

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Franz Wagner's health status

Exactly how much can Orlando get out of Wagner after he returned from a very long absence in the beginning of April? Wagner has been starting since getting back on the floor in time for the home stretch of the season, but he has not been available for many minutes. Wagner played in six of Orlando's final seven games, sitting for half of the Magic's final back-to-back. His minutes totals in those games were as follows: 20, 17, 20, 21, 23, 26.

Clearly, Wagner's capacity is increasing, but for the team's second-highest-usage player and arguably its most impactful player, it does not appear that Orlando will be able to push Wagner the way Nurse has always felt comfortable pushing Maxey. Wagner's high left ankle sprain has been a brutal blow for Orlando for much of the last four-plus months.

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Depth pieces

Orlando's best bench player is a young, long, athletic guard named Anthony Black, who scored a then-career-high 31 points to steal the show when the Magic crushed the Sixers in Philadelphia in November.

Black started in 40 of his 69 appearances this year, logging 29.8 minutes per game. He is likely an overqualified sixth man given how gifted he is defensively in addition to some noteworthy skill development as an offensive player this season. Black averaged career-bests across the board – 15.0 points, 3.8 rebounds, 3.7 assists, 1.4 steals and 0.7 blocks per game – while showing flashes of real promise playing on the ball, including in that November blowout.

Black's three-point volume has gone up quite a bit in his third NBA season, but he is still not a reliable spot-up shooter. He shot 33.3 percent from beyond the arc this season on healthy volume; that percentage is just about in line with his career mark. And, if there is one obvious pattern when surveying Orlando's rotation, it is that there is not much reliable spot-up shooting.

Aside from Bane, the only full-time rotation player on the Magic to shoot over 35.0 percent on three-point attempts this season was Tristian Da Silva, a part-time starter drafted two picks after Jared McCain in 2024. Da Silva shot 37.4 from long range on solid volume (4.2 attempts per game, 6.1 attempts per 36 minutes, 8.1 attempts per 100 possessions). He is a credible wing defender with a good frame, drafted at 23 years old in part because he was expected to contribute right away. He has done that.

Late in the season, Orlando added veteran guard Jevon Carter to the mix. A tough-minded, defensive-oriented player, Carter adds to their slew of defensive weapons that will be utilized against Maxey and Edgecombe. He is a high-volume three-point shooter and finished the season making 36.3 percent of his long-range tries in 53 games between Orlando and the Chicago Bulls. Jamal Cain has been part of the mix lately as an additional bench wing; he shot the ball well from beyond the arc in a small sample this season and recently had a 20-point game against the Chicago Bulls.

Orlando's primary backup center is Goga Bitadze, an analytics darling who is probably one of the best backup bigs in the NBA on a per-minute basis. Bitadze is just about a non-shooter, but he is a terrific rebounder – far and away Orlando's best on the offensive glass – and can block shots at a higher level than Carter. Nurse likes to play the matchups with Drummond and Adem Bona when Embiid is sidelined, and Bona might not be a good matchup for Bitadze on the glass.

"Both of those guys are also good players," Nurse said after the Sixers practiced on Tuesday morning. "Carter is a roller, short pocket guy, athletic, rebounder. Also, they'll park him on the perimeter on the corners. Good shooter. They play through Bitadze a little bit more in some of their trail actions and cutting and things like that. Very good passer, also a very good offensive rebounder. And I think for us, I think there's probably some matchups we like better, but again, it's [going to be] a read of how things are going. I'll say it again: We're going to play Drum, we're going to play Bona, and we've got to figure out what it looks like as the game's going on." 

Lineups of note

Once the Sixers' matchup with Orlando became official, Nurse pointed out that Orlando is finally getting back to full strength at the right time. Wagner is back, and so is Black, who missed about a month but returned to action last Monday.

"Looks like they've got everybody back now, too. I think they're pretty much fully healthy, so that's a very talented team," Nurse said on Sunday. "...They've been one of many teams in the league that hasn't been very healthy this year. So [it's] going to be a really tough game."

Because of their constant injury issues, the Magic have had to rely on a lot of different lineups and groupings throughout the year. Their starting units have been very good, even during Wagner's absence. Generally speaking, Magic head coach Jamahl Mosley staggers Wagner and Banchero so that one of them is on the floor at all times. Lately, Banchero has played with Suggs a lot, while Wagner and Bane have been paired together more often.

Orlando's lineups with only one of Wagner and Banchero have not been particularly good; the Banchero-led lineups without Wagner actually had a negative point differential this season. But Orlando does not have the offensive firepower to score enough with both of those wings on the bench, so Mosley does what he has to do to ensure he can always lean on one of them.

A look at some key Orlando lineups and combinations with their season-long results, courtesy of Cleaning The Glass:

Like the Sixers with Maxey, Edgecombe and Quentin Grimes, Orlando has had extremely successful minutes with three-guard lineups. They have been outstanding with Suggs, Bane and Black all on the floor. Nurse did not want to dive into how the opposing backcourt trios match up with each other. "[A]ll six of those guys are very good, which is probably why both teams end up with that lineup," he said.

Maxey credited Orlando's guards for their defensive physicality and tenacity – "extremely handsy, you've got to be strong with the ball," he added – and is optimistic that the Sixers' guards can have success on both ends of the floor. He averaged more than 30 points per game in three contests against Orlando in the regular season; he and Edgecombe combined to score 69 points in the October win over the Magic.

"Our speed, our playmaking abilities and our scoring and our being able to switch certain guys on certain offensive players," Maxey said, "I think it's going to be good for us."

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