By SAM
GARDNER
FOXSportsFlorida.com
Magic writer
Jan. 26,
2011
The Orlando Magic's 111-96 victory over the Indiana Pacers on Wednesday night wasn't your average late-January win.
No, the Magic didn't clinch a playoff spot with the blowout, and they didn't set any franchise records. But in defeating the Pacers, Coach Stan Van Gundy reached an important milestone.
In just his 292nd game on the Orlando bench, Van Gundy became the first coach in franchise history to reach 200 regular-season wins in one tour with the team. And when you look back at the past 3-1/2 years, you can make a compelling argument that Van Gundy is, by far, the best coach in franchise history.
Rarely one for nostalgia, and never one to take much credit, Van Gundy downplayed his 200-win milestone, which also happened to coincide with the 900th regular-season win in franchise history.
"I would say I did a very good job of taking the job at the right time," Van Gundy said, jokingly. "That's the thing I've done best."
Saying he jumped at the right opportunity is quite the understatement. Everyone knows the story: Once one of the hottest commodities in coaching, Van Gundy turned down an offer to coach the Pacers -- can you imagine if he had been on the opposing bench for Wednesday night's game? -- and he was on the verge of signing a deal to coach the Sacramento Kings when the Magic came calling.
Billy Donovan's flip-flopping and his return to the University of Florida, combined with the Miami Heat's reluctant permission to let the Magic pursue Van Gundy (for the right price, of course), resulted in the perfect storm. And in the end, it was from a Sacramento Kinkos that Van Gundy faxed in his contract to Orlando.
Van Gundy has been critical of his actions, going as far as to apologize for leading the Kings and their fans on and "acting in my own self-interest."
"I'm not happy with the way I handled the whole thing," Van Gundy said to reporters in 2009. "I was not forthcoming on that day, and I should have been when things started to break in Orlando ... The decision (to take the Orlando job) was the right one, but I didn't handle it the right way."
Van Gundy settled in and took over a Magic team that got swept by the Pistons in the first round of the playoffs after a 40-42 season the year before, and it's all been uphill from there.
Van Gundy's team won 52 games in his first year -- the best one-year improvement for a Magic team since Johnny Davis and Chris Jent coached the Magic to a 36-win season in Dwight Howard's rookie year after a 21-61 finish the year before -- and the Magic won their first playoff series since 1996.
The following year Van Gundy led the Magic to the franchise's first NBA Finals appearance since 1995, and Orlando earned the first Finals victory in team history. Last season Orlando was back in the Eastern Conference Finals for the second straight season.
The only other coach in Magic history to reach 200 wins is Brian Hill, but even he didn't do it all at once. Hill led the Magic to their first Finals appearance in 1995, but after a 24-25 start to the 1996-97 season, Hill was fired with an overall regular-season record of 191-104.
In 2005 the Magic rehired Hill, but after two straight sub-.500 seasons, he was fired for the second time, leaving him with an overall record of 267-192.
