Charles Lee Explains What He Saw in the Hornets' Shellacking of Orlando

The head Hornet met with the media to detail what went right in Thursday's victory over the Magic.

Mar 19, 2026; Charlotte, North Carolina, USA; Charlotte Hornets Head Coach Charles Lee watches from the sideline during the third quarter against the Orlando Magic at Spectrum Center. Mandatory Credit: Brian Westerholt-Imagn Images | Brian Westerholt-Imagn Images

Thursday night, the Charlotte Hornets were able to deliver a blowout victory over the Orlando Magic, properly celebrating the legendary Dell Curry, who had his No. 30 jersey officially retired by the organization at halftime.

Here's everything head coach Charles Lee had to say following last night's win.

What changed after the slow start/early timeout

“I thought our guys did a good job of sticking with it. Give Orlando credit. They’re a really good team, they’re well-coached, and they came out and shot the ball well. But the ones we talked about in that timeout was Da Silva’s drive and dump-off for a Bitadze dunk. There was another that we gave up in transition to Bane, so those buckets, we were like, we got to be tighter, we got to be better. I thought that from that point forward, the connectivity, the individual pride, the togetherness was huge, and we grinded them into submission.”

Getting the win for Dell Curry

“It was amazing. It was a perfect ending to a great day, celebrating a great man that’s done so much for us. We loved that he was able to come into the locker room and break it down for us. I think the guys enjoyed his speech way better than mine.”

Having balanced scoring

“We understand we need each other to have success. The way we play offensively is to trust the pass at all times. The guys are doing it at a high level. One of the things we talked about when we were seeing all the pressure was the best way to get the ball up the court is to pass the ball. Don’t feel like you’ve got to dribble through everyone and do it yourself. Part of that is your teammates running with purpose, too.”

Getting Sion James in the game early

“It was definitely a little bit of strategy. Sion has just been so impressive defensively lately, and there’s a couple matchups that we identified in our coach’s meeting where we wanted Sion out there in certain moments. I think he did a great job. I’m not a huge plus-minus guy all the time, but I do think that you feel his +30 tonight. No matter how many points he’s scoring, his impact on the game, his physicality defensively, the offensive stuff he’s doing too, it’s helping out the team in a lot of different ways.”

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