Magic fire Jamahl Mosley after 5 seasons as coach, 3 first-round playoff appearances

Jamahl Mosley was fired as coach of the Orlando Magic on Monday, paying the widely expected price after the team blew a 3-1 series lead and got eliminated by the Detroit Pistons in Round 1 of the Eastern Conference playoffs.

It was Orlando’s third consecutive first-round playoff exit, and easily the most disappointing. Not only did the eighth-seeded Magic lose all three chances to upset the top-seeded Pistons, but one of those games saw Orlando have a 24-point second-half lead at home and still lose. Orlando missed 23 consecutive shots in that Game 6 loss on Friday, getting booed by fans when it was over.

That loss probably was the one that sealed Mosley’s fate, even though the loss in Game 7 at Detroit on Sunday was the one that ended the season.

“That’s a gut punch and that’s going to remain with our team this summer,” Magic president of basketball operations Jeff Weltman said. “We know a lot of our season will be filtered through that lens. I think what happened is we were up 3-1 against the No. 1 seed in the East that won 60 games and Franz (Wagner) got hurt and it altered the series. We still had two chances to put them away in Games 5 and 6. There’s a lot to be taken away from that. I don’t want to overreact to the second half of Game 6 the same way I don’t want to overreact to the first half of Game 6 when we were up 22 points. It’s our job to step back and look at the big picture of what works, what doesn’t work.”

Mosley is the third-winningest coach in Magic history, his 189 wins behind only Brian Hill (267) and Stan Van Gundy (259). He inherited a team that was in the early stages of a rebuild, with Wagner and Jalen Suggs entering the league as rookies in his first season and then the Magic winning the lottery to draft Paolo Banchero No. 1 overall before Mosley’s second season.

Orlando won 22 games in Mosley’s first season, improved to 34-48 in Year 2 and has been .500 or better in all three seasons since — 47-35 in 2023-24, 41-41 last season and 45-37 this season.

“That’s an organizational matter,” Weltman said about three straight first-round exits. “That’s not on one person but it just seems like it’s time for a new perspective, a fresh voice and for all of us to get a different vantage point on what’s going on with our team.”

The Magic are one of 10 teams — Boston, Cleveland, Denver, Houston, the Los Angeles Clippers, the Los Angeles Lakers, Minnesota, New York, Oklahoma City are the others — to have not finished below .500 in any of the last three seasons.

It wasn’t enough. And with much of the team’s core — Banchero, Wagner, Suggs, Desmond Bane and more — under contract for the foreseeable future, the Magic clearly felt the best way to shake things up was to bring in a new coach.

“It has been an incredible five-plus years, and this organization and city will always mean so much to me and my family,” Mosley said. “In my heart, I truly hope that during our time here we were able to impact the players, staff, and the Magic organization in a meaningful and lasting way. I want to sincerely thank the DeVos family for the extraordinary opportunity to serve as head coach of the Orlando Magic. To our fans, there is nothing but love in my heart.”

It is a roster in need of upgrading in some ways, shooting perhaps foremost among them after Orlando was only 27th in the 30-team league in 3-point percentage this season. Injuries have also been a major issue for the Magic, including in the playoffs — with Wagner unable to play in the final three games, all losses, against Detroit.

Mosley’s job security was a talking point for much of the season, especially amid reports that he and Banchero were not on the same page. In March, Banchero acknowledged that were some moments of conflict — but thought Orlando was better for going through that.

“We’re both competitors,” Banchero said when asked then about his relationship with Mosley. “There were times where I was frustrated and I wasn’t playing as well as I think I should be. But it never became me pointing the finger at him or being disrespectful. It was all constructive; he’s talking to me, I’m talking to him. And winning, it cures everything.”

Evidently, there wasn’t enough winning.

Mosley had two seasons left on an extension that he and the Magic agreed on in March 2024. The team lauded his “preparation, work ethic, ability to connect with the players and passion he brings to the job every day brings positive results, both on the court and off” when announcing that deal.

Barely two years later, he and the Magic were parting ways.

Only seven coaches have been in their current jobs longer than Mosley was with Orlando — Miami’s Erik Spoelstra (hired in 2008), Golden State’s Steve Kerr (2014), the Clippers’ Tyronn Lue (2020), Oklahoma City’s Mark Daigneault (2020), Minnesota’s Chris Finch (2021), Indiana’s Rick Carlisle (2021) and Dallas’ Jason Kidd (2021).

Mosley spent 15 years as an assistant in Denver, Cleveland and Dallas — and was often mentioned as a candidate for head-coaching jobs around the league over that span — before Orlando hired him. He had a long relationship with Weltman, who first took note of Mosley when they worked together with the Nuggets.

Mosley was the 14th coach in Magic history, the 15th if counting Billy Donovan — who accepted the job in 2007, then had second thoughts and returned to the University of Florida. Donovan just left the Chicago Bulls after six seasons as their coach, which sparked speculation that he could be the front-runner in Orlando if the Magic indeed would be moving on from Mosley.