Orlando Magic: 4 areas they need to build on for next season

1. 3-point shooting

Defensive rating is the No. 1 concern for this team for sure, but the reason it doesn’t take top spot here is because how little confidence we should have in the Magic improving dramatically in that area between now and next season.

However, 3-point shooting is the most important thing a team can do well in the NBA today, and it has been the key to moving to a smaller, faster league.

The Magic currently sit 20th (35.7 percent) in 3-point shooting, but the real positive here is that they led the league at one point early in the season. That was never going to last, and the fall from grace has been hard with players going through prolonged cold streaks.

But we know the Magic are capable of being a good shooting team, and so getting to above-average next season is entirely possible, if not probable.

This is because they’ll be returning their younger players, who will hopefully continue to improve their outside stroke. Even more encouraging is the fact the Magic have already made a significant jump in this area, as they ranked 29th (32.8 percent) last season.

So they have previous evidence in their abilities to make real strides in their long distance shooting in a relatively short amount of time.

Next: 2017-18 Week 19 NBA Power Rankings

That’ll be doubly true once they get Jonathan Isaac back healthy, as well as Terrence Ross, which is why this is the real key stat for the team next season, and something to stat building toward now.