ORLANDO, Fla. — Sigh.

The hated Heat have done it again.

Yes, the Miami Heat have managed to once again overshadow the Orlando Magic.

It’s no secret the the NBA has always felt a little different in Florida. Two franchises entered the league within a year of each other, both trying to carve out an identity in a transient state better known for beaches than basketball. Yet somehow, nearly four decades later, one franchise has become a global brand while the other remains trapped in a cycle of “maybe next year.”

And now, with the Miami Heat landing superstar Giannis Antetokounmpo from the Milwaukee Bucks, the branding gap between Florida’s two NBA teams just became impossible to ignore.

For Orlando Magic fans, this isn’t just another blockbuster trade. It’s another reminder of how the basketball universe seems to always bend in Miami’s favor.

The Heat have four championships and a culture that attracts stars and commands national attention. Every few years, when it appears Miami is headed for a rebuilding phase, Pat Riley reaches into his bag of tricks and somehow pulls out another superstar.

Meanwhile, Orlando is still waiting for its first title and hasn’t won a playoff series in 16 years.

That’s what makes this so frustrating.

The Magic weren’t supposed to be the forgotten franchise. They arrived in the NBA essentially alongside Miami. In the early 1990s, Orlando looked like the organization with the brighter future. Shaquille O’Neal and Penny Hardaway were supposed to deliver championships. Instead, Shaq left town, headed west to Los Angeles, took the Magic’s championship dreams with him and helped build a Lakers dynasty.

To make matters worse, Shaq was later traded to the hated Heat and helped them win their first championship.

The Magic did manage to reach the NBA Finals in 2009 behind Dwight Howard, but the Magic’s championship window officially closed a year later when LeBron James and Chris Bosh joined Dwyane Wade with the hated Heat, creating one of the most talented teams in league history and turning Miami into basketball’s center of gravity.

For Magic fans, the past fifteen years have largely been spent watching Miami dominate headlines, playoff races and championship conversations, while Orlando has endured rebuild after rebuild.

Now comes Giannis.

The Magic finally have a promising young core. Paolo Banchero looks like a franchise superstar. Franz Wagner is one of the league’s most versatile players. Orlando has built patiently and intelligently. There is genuine hope.

Yet the moment the Magic begin to rise, Miami pulls off the Giannis trade and appears ready to leapfrog them again.

That’s the part that stings.

It’s not that Orlando can’t become a contender. It’s that every major basketball story in Florida somehow seems to end with Miami standing in the spotlight. The Heat have spent decades proving they are the destination franchise in Florida. The Magic have spent those same decades trying to convince everyone they belong in the same conversation.

Sigh.

CHICAGO — Caleb Wilson took less than three days before he threw down the gauntlet.

He needed just enough time to finish celebrating his selection by the Bulls with the No. 4 pick in Tuesday night’s NBA draft in New York, to pack up his family for a flight to Chicago and to tour his new digs on Madison Street.

By the time Wilson sat down in front of the media Friday morning at the Advocate Center for his introductory news conference with fellow first-rounder Dailyn Swain, the forward from North Carolina was ready to announce his expectations for his first NBA season.

“I expect to have Rookie of the Year, honestly,” Wilson said. “I’m going to work hard. I’m going to do what it takes. I feel like the team is really good for me and how I envision to play. I know I’m a hard worker, so whatever I need to fix and work on throughout the season and before the season, I’m going to work on it so I can be a great player.”

Wilson spent most of the predraft whirlwind on the outside looking in. The mass consensus — by the media, by experts and ultimately by the draft order itself — was that the 2026 draft class featured a clear top trio. Wilson was the next man up.

He tried not to take it personally. But as a rookie, Wilson doesn’t plan to abide by that hierarchy.

Experience helps buoy Wilson’s confidence in his standing with the top three picks. He scored 24 points in North Carolina’s 13-point victory over Darryn Peterson’s Kansas team in November. And he scored 23 in a three-point win over Cameron Boozer and Duke in February. (Wilson was sidelined for the rematch in March, a five-point loss for the Tar Heels.)

Wilson’s sole loss against the top three came at the hands of AJ Dybantsa and BYU by a 78-76 score — and Wilson scored a game-high 22 points and grabbed 10 rebounds.

This friendly rivalry will fuel Wilson throughout his rookie season. It also will fuel the league around him as the NBA sets a clear priority to showcase its newest talent.

Wilson and the Bulls will face each of the top three picks in their first three summer league games in Las Vegas: July 10 versus No. 3 pick Boozer and the Memphis Grizzlies (7 p.m., Prime Video), July 13 against No. 2 pick Peterson and the Utah Jazz (8 p.m., ESPN) and July 14 versus No. 1 pick Dybantsa and the Washington Wizards (7 p.m., Prime). The Bulls’ fourth summer league game will be July 16 against the Los Angeles Lakers (5 p.m., Prime).

“I played all of them now,” Wilson said. “You know what happened when I played them, so it don’t really matter. I don’t really care about the media. I’m a competitor. I’m going to play them in summer league too. So whatever needs to be done to prove that I’m on the same level or that I’m better, we’ll do it.”

Three days into his tenure as a Bull, Wilson’s bold proclamations already have become the norm around the Advocate Center. There’s a magnitude to the rookie’s vision — for himself, for the future, for the Bulls as a franchise.

Wilson is young, quick to smile and relaxed in front of media. But he’s not soft-spoken. And he doesn’t balk at setting the bar an inch or a mile above his reach.

“I have a lot of fun with it, but I want to be legendary,” Wilson said. “I want to be remembered after I finish playing. That’s what pushes me every day to be a great player.”

When Wilson talks about greatness, he means the upper echelon of NBA history. In Chicago, playing under the six banners won during a dynasty that ended eight years before he was born, that means something different.

Is it a risk to reach for GOAT status while playing in Michael Jordan’s shadow? Wilson believes that’s a myopic way to view his idealism.

“I don’t worry about that at all,” he said. “Striving for something is something that we all do. You’re striving to be the greatest ever — it is a bold thing to say, but that’s what I’m striving for. I’m not striving to be an average or mediocre player. If I was to tell you or anyone that, that wouldn’t be good either.

“I’m striving to be the best player that has ever played the game, and I’ve been doing that for a long time. So I’m just going to keep doing that. If I reach that goal, I do. If I don’t, then at least I know I tried.”

For Wilson, establishing himself as a cornerstone of a team on the way up is a welcome luxury. Even as a rookie who doesn’t turn 20 until next month, he sees himself as a leader and galvanizer who can shape the culture of the Bulls locker room.

But rebuilding also means losing. A lot. Wilson must stomach this reality in order to survive the next year — or two or three — as the Bulls undergo the grueling process of reshaping the roster under a new front office and new coach.

Wilson described a symbiotic relationship between his individual growth and that of his new team. The Bulls will get better if he gets better. He will get better if the Bulls get better. Neither can succeed without the other. He wouldn’t want it any other way.

“I feel like the NBA is better when Chicago is good,” Wilson said. “I’m just trying to be as good as I can be. I’m going to develop and I’m going to keep getting better, and whatever happens will happen.

“But of course I want to be a great team, so I’m trying to get that to happen as quick as I can.”

Jun. 25—Gonzaga has now gone two years without a Sweet 16 appearance or NBA draft pick — droughts that probably felt inconceivable during a nine-year run when Mark Few's program didn't miss the second weekend of the NCAA Tournament and churned out 12 total NBA selections.

The Zags hope to break both dry spells next year and NBA analysts forecasting next year's draft class already think GU is in a strong position to have at least one selection — if not multiple — when the draft comes back around next June.

Gonzaga's Davis Fogle and Massamba Diop both appeared in way-too-early mock drafts published by national media outlets hours after Wednesday's 2026 NBA Draft concluded at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York.

Fogle's name appeared most frequently, with multiple publications projecting the sophomore wing as either a first- or second-round pick in 2027. In Bleacher Report's way-too-early mock draft, author Jonathan Wasserman projects Fogle to be picked No. 28 overall by the Oklahoma City Thunder. CBS Sports didn't include Fogle in its first-round projections, but writer Adam Finkelstein highlighted Fogle as one of the returning college players "expected to make a jump" in 2026-27.

"Essentially, these would be players who weren't viewed as first-round candidates this year, but could be on the verge of a breakout season," Finkelstein wrote. "These are harder to forecast, but some of the players I'll be watching most closely include Duke's Dame Sarr, USC's Alijah Arenas, NC State's Paul McNeil, Texas' Matas Vokietaitis, Miami's Shelton Henderson, Arizona's Ivan Kharchenkov, and Gonzaga's Davis Fogle."

ESPN's Jeremy Woo is bullish on both Zags hearing their names called next June. Woo predicts Diop to go slightly higher than Fogle, penciling the 7-foot Arizona State transfer in at No. 41. Fogle is projected as the 49th overall pick in ESPN's mock draft.

Fogle has been on the radar of NBA scouts since his senior year at Arizona Compass Prep and transformed into one of Gonzaga's top scorers toward the end of his freshman campaign, averaging 8.6 points and 3.1 rebounds. From Jan. 15, when Fogle cracked Gonzaga's rotation against Washington State, to the season finale against Texas at the NCAA Tournament, the wing averaged 10.6 points and 4.5 rebounds, making 50% of his shots from the field.

Diop comes to Gonzaga as one of the most coveted players in the transfer portal. The 7-foot-1, 230-pound center averaged 13.6 points, 5.8 rebounds and 2.1 blocks as a freshman at Arizona State, ranking second in the Big 12 in the final category. A long, athletic rim protector who occasionally demonstrated the ability to play out on the perimeter, Diop chose Gonzaga over St. John's, which reportedly prepared a substantial NIL offer to secure the transfer's services.

Gonzaga's last NBA draft pick came in 2024, when forward Anton Watson — a former Gonzaga Prep standout — was selected No. 54 overall by the Boston Celtics. The Zags had at least one player selected in every draft from 2021-24 and seven total draft picks during that stretch.

Jun. 25—One week after getting the green light to compete in the NBA from the league's fitness-to-play panel, Gonzaga's Tyon Grant-Foster has accepted a Summer League invitation from one of the NBA's top franchises.

Grant-Foster agreed to join the Western Conference champion San Antonio Spurs at Las Vegas Summer League, Jon Chepkevich of DraftExpress reported Thursday.

The Summer League showcase runs July 9-19, with games taking place at the Thomas & Mack Center and COX Pavilion on UNLV's campus.

The 26-year-old wing becomes the second member of Gonzaga's 2025-26 roster to reach an agreement with an NBA team, joining the Spurs one day after teammate Graham Ike inked an Exhibit 10 contract with the Golden State Warriors.

Grant-Foster was able to land a Summer League deal despite missing much of the pre-draft process due to ongoing concerns about his medical history. The 6-foot-7 wing previously had not been cleared and was deemed "medically unfit" after his heart defibrillator was activated on multiple occasions during a two-year stint at Grand Canyon.

The defibrillator was installed when Grant-Foster, who deals with a heart condition known as arrhythmogenic cardiomyopathy, underwent two separate cardiac arrest incidents after joining DePaul's roster in 2021-22.

Despite the medical setbacks, Grant-Foster has been on the NBA's radar for years and received multiple letters of support from general managers when he filed a lawsuit against the NCAA after the sport's governing body denied his eligibility waiver last summer.

Grant-Foster was cleared to play at Gonzaga after receiving a preliminary injunction in Spokane County Court and played in all 35 games for Mark Few's team, primarily coming off the bench.

The veteran wing averaged 11.1 points, 5.0 rebounds and 1.1 blocks for the Zags, supplying defense and athleticism for a team that won a share of the West Coast Conference regular-season championship and captured the WCC Tournament title.Grant-Foster played a key role in two of GU's wins over WCC runner-up Santa Clara, scoring 20 points both in a Feb. 14 road win over the Broncos and in the Zags' 79-68 victory in the conference title game.

Coming off an NBA Finals appearance, San Antonio is still in the process of building its Summer League team, but the roster is expected to include the Spurs' four draft picks: Kentucky center Jayden Quaintance (No. 20 overall), UConn center Tarris Reed (No. 26), Tennessee guard Ja'Kobi Gillespie (No. 42) and Duke forward Maliq Brown (No. 44).

Other Gonzaga players such as wing Jalen Warley and guard Adam Miller could be in the mix to sign undrafted free-agent deals or receive Summer League deals in the coming days.

Former Gonzaga wing Michael Ajayi, who spent one season in Spokane during the 2024-25 season between stops at Pepperdine and Butler, agreed to a two-way contract with the Charlotte Hornets late Wednesday night after the second round of the NBA draft concluded. Ajayi excelled last season at Butler, averaging a double-double of 16.4 ppg and 11.1 rpg while setting the Bulldogs' single-season rebounding record and earning All-Big East honors.

Shortly after Izaiyah Nelson learned Wednesday night he had been selected by the Magic in the second round of the NBA draft, the University of South Florida senior couldn’t contain his excitement.

On a phone call with team officials, including president of basketball operations Jeff Weltman, Nelson said he planned on driving from Tampa to Orlando on Thursday morning with the intention of beating them into the building for workouts at the AdventHealth Training Center.

“He’s just about the work,” Weltman said about the No. 51 pick in a phone interview following the draft. “He’s a breath of fresh air in that most of the time when you’re looking through the draft lens, you’re looking at younger guys who are really going to need to develop personal routines and habits.

“And Izaiyah comes in really mature, understanding that it’s going to take a lot of work for him to get to where he wants to get, understanding that winning comes before all else,” Weltman added. “I think he’s got a lot of that stuff that he brings with him that you don’t have to kind of wait on and develop and hope that he finds it.”

Orlando entered the second round only with the No. 46 pick, but later completed a three-team trade with Washington and Milwaukee that netted the Magic both Nelson at No. 51 from the Wizards and cash considerations from the Bucks.

As part of the deal, Washington acquired the draft rights to University of Tennessee forward Felix Okpara (No. 46), while Milwaukee acquired the draft rights to Malique Lewis (No. 60), who played for the South East Melbourne Phoenix of the Australian National Basketball League.

Nelson stood out to Orlando because of his ability to impact the game on both ends of the court. The 6-foot-9 forward, who turns 23 on Oct. 1, became the first player in American Athletic Conference history to be named the league’s player of the year, defensive player of the year and newcomer of the year when he transferred to USF after three years at Arkansas State.

The Marietta, Ga. native, who helped the Bulls earn their first NCAA Tournament berth since 2012, recorded the ninth-most double-doubles in the country (18) and ranked 18th nationally in rebounding (9.6 rebounds per game) this past season.

But where does Nelson fit into Orlando’s plans moving forward under new head coach Sean Sweeney? That remains unclear.

While he’s proven to impact the game in more ways than one, he doesn’t help the Magic in a dire area of need: 3-point shooting. As a senior at USF, he shot 14.3% from distance on 1.4 long-range attempts per game.

Still, he led the AAC in field-goal percentage (56.1%), while averaging 15.9 points per contest. Nelson also boasts a massive 7-foot-2 wingspan and has been heralded for playing with a relentless motor by chasing after loose balls, crashing the glass and outworking opponents.

“I think it’s too soon to talk about stuff like that,” Weltman said about Nelson’s fit on the Magic. “Obviously, we’ve got a roster full of talented players and we have to figure out how that’s all going to work with Sean. There’s a long way to go before we kind of get to the end of summer and understand what our team looks like.

“But most importantly (Wednesday night), it’s about just bringing in talent, character, toughness and integrity, and we’ll figure the rest out as we go,” Weltman added.

As a late second-round pick, it also wasn’t immediately clear which type of contract Nelson will sign with the franchise.

The Magic enter the summer with three standard contract roster spots open and two of three two-way contracts available, but not much room financially to add to the roster through free agency compared to the past. That’s because Orlando has signed key young players, such as Paolo Banchero, Franz Wagner and Jalen Suggs, to large rookie extensions in recent years.

Two-way players go between the NBA and the G League, but they’re limited to being active for just 50 NBA games and can’t play in the playoffs. Nelson wouldn’t face those restrictions if he signed a standard contract.

Orlando signed last year’s second-round pick Noah Penda to a standard contract, but he was picked 19 spots higher (No. 32) than Nelson was Wednesday.

“These days you want to leave yourself as flexible as possible and obviously different commitments have different financial implications. So as we piece together the roster, we’ll make sense of all of that,” Weltman said when asked by the Orlando Sentinel if Nelson would sign a standard contract or a two-way deal. “It all kind of fits together.

“But the most important thing for us is we just want to get him in the gym soon, get him working with our guys and getting to know our organization,” Weltman added.

Nelson will hit the court soon for Las Vegas Summer League, which runs July 9-19 out west. The second-round pick will be joined by last year’s pair of Magic draft picks, Jase Richardson and the French forward Penda, Weltman confirmed.

Regardless of what the future holds for Nelson, it’s clear why the Magic made a move to draft him Wednesday night.

“This guy is a worker,” Weltman said. “He’s tough. He’s a hit-first guy. He’s about self-improvement. He’s about winning above everything else. (A) monster competitor, monster athlete.

“Just the kind of guy you want to bring into an organization.”

Jason Beede can be reached at jbeede@orlandosentinel.com