Hornets’ Charles Lee reveals the bright side of Play-In loss to Magic

On Friday night, the Charlotte Hornets joined the 12 teams that were already out of playoff contention, seeing their season come to an end in such disappointing fashion in a 121-90 defeat to the Orlando Magic in the battle for the eighth seed in the play-in tournament. The Hornets looked like one of the fastest-rising teams in the NBA in the second half of the 2025-26 season, but their season ended quite abruptly.

Many fans were excited at the notion of the Hornets clinching a playoff spot and competing against the Detroit Pistons after the two teams triggered the most memorable brawl of the 2025-26 campaign earlier in the season. But there is plenty of good for the Hornets to hold on to even though their season stunningly ended in a 31-point defeat.

After the game, Hornets head coach Charles Lee admitted that this loss “hurts”, as per Danielle Stein of WCNC Charlotte. Nonetheless, for such a young team, this should be nothing other than a trying moment for the squad to learn from. Lee hopes that this defeat, especially when it came at such a crushing manner, fuels the team moving forward.

The Hornets’ young core of LaMelo Ball, Brandon Miller, and Kon Knueppel should be together for the foreseeable future, and the team’s cap situation is as healthy as it can get, which means that the sky is the limit for this up-and-coming team.

Charlotte did figure out how to lean into its strength as a team — playing with pace and space all while carrying themselves with so much swagger. There is no coincidence that the Hornets posted an incredible margin of victory this season, dominating bad and good teams alike.

But for now, the Hornets will have the rest of the offseason to gather themselves and prepare to do it all again come next season.