Magic name four to athletic staff

The Orlando Magic on Monday announced several important hires.

The team named Ernest Eugene its new head athletic trainer, Luke Storey its new head strength and conditioning coach, Sameer Mehta its new physical therapist and Nathan Spencer its new performance and rehabilitation coach.

Eugene spent the last four seasons as Virginia Tech’s assistant athletic director for sports medicine. Before that, Eugene worked as the athletic trainer for Marquette’s men’s basketball team and completed his six-year tenure at the school as its director of sports medicine. From 2003 through 2008, he worked as an assistant athletic trainer for the Washington Wizards.

Storey worked from 2013 through this year at Peak Performance Project, a sports performance facility known as P3 that employs advanced technology to train pro athletes. Storey began his tenure at P3 as a senior performance specialist and later was promoted to director of performance.

Mehta worked the last 12 years at MedStar Georgetown University Hospital.

Spencer spent the last three seasons as the head strength and conditioning coach for the Illawarra Hawks of Australia’s National Basketball League.

The hires complete a search process that began on April 16, when the Magic dismissed members of its athletic-training and strengthand-conditioning staffs, including longtime athletic trainer Keon Weise and strength and conditioning coach Bill Burgos.

Christian Espinoza, who spent last season as an intern, has been promoted to a full-time position as an assistant athletic trainer. Applied sports scientist Chad Gerhard and athletic trainer/manual therapist Aki Tajima also remain a part of the staff.