Knicks come out flat vs. Magic, suffer first home loss of season in 124-107 rout

Peter Sblendorio, New York Daily News on Nov 12, 2025

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NEW YORK — For the first time this season, there was no Madison Square Garden magic for the Knicks.

Instead, it was the Orlando Magic who looked right at home at MSG on Wednesday night, routing the Knicks, 124-107, to deal them their first home loss of the 2025-26 campaign.

Playing on the second night of a back-to-back, the Knicks (7-4) came out flat and never recovered, struggling with the physicality of an Orlando team (6-6) that boasted the Eastern Conference’s most efficient defense last season.

The loss snapped the Knicks’ five-game winning streak and dropped them to 7-1 at the Garden.

It was the most lopsided loss of the young season for the Knicks, who had scored at least 130 points in each of the previous three games.

Franz Wagner led the Magic with 28 points on 10-of-22 shooting and nine rebounds, picking up the slack after Paolo Banchero, Orlando’s top scorer and rebounder, left in the second quarter with a groin strain and did not return.

Jalen Brunson led the Knicks with 31 points on 10-of-23 shooting and six assists before fouling out late in the fourth quarter. He went straight to the locker room, appearing to walk with a slight limp.

The Knicks committed six turnovers in the first quarter and nine in the first half, after which they trailed, 62-42. They shot just 13 of 39 (33.3%) from the field and 4 of 19 (21.1%) on 3-pointers before halftime.

It was a far cry from Tuesday night’s 133-120 win over the Memphis Grizzlies, during which the Knicks erupted for 42 points in the first quarter alone.

Brunson scored 16 points in the first half, but the rest of the Knicks totaled 26 on 9-of-29 shooting.

The Knicks trailed by as many as 21 points before halftime.

They were outscored, 32-19, during a second quarter in which Wagner scored 13 points on 6-of-11 shooting, burning the Knicks with an array of crafty layups and a second-chance 3-pointer.

The Knicks delivered multiple second-half runs, but every time they appeared to be closing in, Orlando responded with a timely basket.

After Landry Shamet’s pull-up jumper cut the Magic lead to 75-64 at the 5:28 mark of the third, Wendell Carter Jr. made a dunk and Wagner nailed a 3-pointer on back-to-back possessions.

Karl-Anthony Towns and Jordan Clarkson made 3-pointers on back-to-back possessions early in the fourth quarter, but Orlando’s Anthony Black answered both with driving floaters.

And mere seconds after a Brunson jumper made it a 100-91 game with 6:04 left in regulation — marking the Knicks’ first single-digit deficit since the second quarter — Jalen Suggs answered with a dagger 3-pointer.

A day after the Knicks set a franchise record with 55 attempts from 3-point range, and made 22 of them, they shot just 11 of 36 (30.6%) on 3-pointers.

Towns finished with 15 points and 12 rebounds, but other than him and Brunson, nobody scored in double figures.

Wednesday’s game served as an early-season litmus test for a pair of Eastern Conference teams with lofty aspirations.

Armed with a lineup of recent lottery picks, the Magic have made the playoffs two years in a row but were eliminated in the first round both times.

In an aggressive effort to take the next step, Orlando acquired sharp-shooting Desmond Bane from the Grizzlies during the offseason for a package that included four first-round picks.

The big swing made the Magic a trendy sleeper pick in the wide-open East, though they started the season just 1-4 as their new-look roster struggled to jell early on.

But Orlando looked cohesive on Wednesday as six players scored in double figures, including Bane, who had 22 points, and Black, who added 17 off the bench. Banchero finished with four points and four rebounds in 12 minutes before exciting.

The Knicks had won the first five games of their season-long seven-game homestand before Wednesday’s loss. They will try to end the homestand on a high note on Friday night, when they host the Miami Heat.