The Osceola Magic are walking into a season with a nearly blank slate, but the expectations haven’t budged an inch.
That’s the reality for a G-League team that has made winning look routine. Osceola has finished with the top record in the Eastern Conference in each of the last three years, then pushed all the way to the G-League Finals in 2025 and the Eastern Conference Finals in 2026. Now the roster looks different, the coaching staff looks different, and the challenge is the same: keep the machine humming.
Ronnie Burrell is the new voice in charge after replacing Dylan Murphy, who left for an assistant job at Michigan. Burrell inherits a team that opens the season Sunday at home against the Oklahoma City Blue, and he’s already making the tone clear.
"There is a tradition of winning here," coach Ronnie Burrell said. "There is also a tradition of development.
Our priority is to help these guys get better and win in conjunction with that. When you put a group of players on the floor who are well-rounded and have high character, those are winning teams."
The roster turnover is significant. Malaki Branham and J.D.
Davison arrive as Magic training camp invitees, bringing proven G-League production with them. Ace Baldwin and Johnell Davis are the only returning players from last season’s team.
Even with all that change, Osceola’s identity is supposed to stay familiar. In camp, defense kept coming up again and again as the central message from Burrell.
That emphasis fits the league. The G-League can be a numbers-heavy, fast-paced offensive showcase, but the teams that separate themselves usually do it with discipline, connectivity and effort on the defensive end. It’s also the kind of basketball NBA teams notice when they’re searching for role players who can fit into a system.
"You hope that it all comes together," Osceola general manager Kevin Tiller said. "That’s why we try to find guys who are wiling to play team basketball.
Coach Ronnie has done a great job early of preaching defense and preachign moving the ball. We try to keep things simple but we want guys to be themselves as well.
That balance - structure with room for individuality - is part of what Osceola believes has kept the program strong. The goal remains the same as always: compete every night, develop players, and give them a path toward the NBA.
Branham and Davison are central to that plan. Branham averaged 20.3 points per game and shot 36.4 percent from three, continuing to work on a perimeter shot that has been a major factor in his push for a steadier NBA role. Davison, meanwhile, put up 25.2 points, 6.8 assists and 6.6 rebounds per game for the Rio Grand Valley Vipers, and he has scored at least 20.0 points per game in each of the last three seasons.
That kind of firepower gives Osceola some offensive punch, but the team’s public face is still built around defense, grit and togetherness. The connection to the Orlando Magic reinforces that approach.
Outside of the Orlando Magic’s two-way players - Alex Morales, Colin Castleton and Izaiyah Nelson - G-League players can move freely around the league. Still, Osceola and Orlando share more than a logo. The two teams are aligned in the kind of players they value and the way they want to play.
Like the parent club, Osceola is focused on versatile defenders and a group-first feel. That culture matters in a league where players are constantly trying to stand out while also fitting into a bigger picture.
"It’s really just home," said Au’Diese Toney, who is back with the Magic after spending a few years overseas. "They only get guys that they believe in.
The guys that come here, they believe in them and the organization as well. It’s more so the organization is a unity and family."
Burrell will put his own stamp on things, but the broad themes sound familiar to what Sean Sweeney is pushing with the parent club. The message from camp has been about defending, competing and trusting the group, not chasing empty offensive numbers.
That’s the job now for a team trying to keep a standard that has been hard to reach and even harder to repeat.
"You can try to do the same thing over again, it’s hard," Malaki Branham said. "Every single year it’s new players and new teammates that you have to adjust to.
It’s a new group. But just really figuring each other out day by day."
For Osceola, that’s the whole assignment: take a new group, make it fit, and find a way back to the level the franchise has already shown it can reach.
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For Orlando, the warning signs are familiar enough: turnovers have too often undercut good stretches, and the shooting percentages have not always been kind. The injury report also adds another layer to the setup, with Mark Williams, Jordan Goodwin and Rasheer Fleming all out for Phoenix, leaving the Suns a little thinner as both teams settle into projected starting lineups and try to control a game that could swing on a few extra possessions. [Read more 🡒]
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Burrell arrives with a strong rsum, including G League Coach of the Year honors in 2023, along with years of NBA and professional playing experience that should give this group a steady hand. The bigger story for Orlando is how often the roster may overlap with the NBA team, since some of the two-way players are expected to move back and forth as the season unfolds, making Osceola a place where the Magics next wave can be watched up close. [Read more 🡒]
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Phoenix got steady production from Devin Booker, who dictated plenty of the flow for the Suns and helped keep Orlando from ever fully settling in. The bigger issue for the Magic was self-inflicted, with turnovers repeatedly handing the Suns easy opportunities and leaving Orlando to wonder how a game with so many extra possessions wound up feeling so out of reach. [Read more 🡒]