Magic like gearing up for regular season

Following three preseason games, the Magic feel confident about the direction that their team is taking into the regular season that tips off Wednesday against Houston at Amway Center.

The team knows what it is good at — sharing the ball to find easy baskets, spacing the floor and playing solid defense — and what it needs to continue to improve on — avoiding turnovers, crashing the boards and shooting accurately from 3-point range.

Tuesday’s 104-92 home loss to the Pelicans was a prime example of those areas.

Although Orlando finished with 27 assists, the team turned the ball over 19 times. Despite forcing 19 turnovers themselves, the Magic allowed New Orleans to score 22 fast-break points. The Pelicans also out-rebounded Orlando 47-39.

And while individual players shot the ball well from deep (Franz Wagner 3 of 6 from 3; Moe Wagner 2 of 4), the group as a whole finished 28% beyond the arc.

“It’s in the details and I don’t think we really executed that,” Magic coach Jamahl Mosley said after the game. “We did some good things throughout the night but then you turn around and look at being able to sustain that same effort.”

Of course, the wins and losses don’t count in the preseason. Instead, the exhibitions are meant for learning, growing and getting better, Mosley said.

Based on what he’s seen so far, Moe Wagner believes that Orlando has the potential to be one of the better defensive teams in the league.

“We’ve showed that all three games [through] the way that we communicate our way and the way we play off each other defensively,” he said.

Mosley agrees with Wagner. “When we get in the halfcourt, we’ll be one of the toughest teams to score on because of our length, size and ability to communicate,” the Magic coach said.

In order to get into halfcourt defense, however, Orlando will have to play clean basketball on offense. Avoiding turnovers forces opposing teams to run set plays rather than get out in transition for easy baskets.

“It’s part of the defense,” Wagner said about taking care of the basketball. “Our strength is defense, so you want to slow them down, and turnovers doesn’t achieve that.

“At the same time, turnovers are not a shot for you. Obviously it’s just preseason but that’s got to be the mentality.”

One key player to Orlando’s success on defense this year could be Jonathan Isaac. Staying healthy will be important because when he’s on the court, Isaac can change the defensive calculus.

In just 10 minutes Tuesday, the 6-10 forward recorded 3 blocks, disrupted even more and grabbed 3 rebounds.

“It’s almost challenging because you’re so trained to help but with him you don’t have to,” Wagner said about his teammate. “He takes it up on himself not wanting help either. He basically takes the pick-and-roll out of the equation.

“He makes up for mistakes, and it’s great to have him on our team.”

Isaac and Orlando will play one more tuneup game Friday (7 p.m., Bally Sports) against Brazilian team Flamengo. Franz Wagner has been pleased with what he saw from his team against three NBA squads in the preseason but knows there’s room for improvement.

“We played overall with great effort all of these three games,” he said. “It’s going to come down to not beating ourselves with a lot of turnovers. We have to clean that up.”