To say it’s been a whirl­wind for Pao­lo Banchero, who the Orlan­do Mag­ic draft­ed with the No. 1 pick, since Thurs­day evening would be an understatement.

Espe­cial­ly since he was sur­round­ed by uncer­tain­ty until moments before NBA Com­mis­sion­er Adam Sil­ver took the draft stage at Bar­clays Cen­ter in New York City.

The Mag­ic, who’ve tak­en pride in being one of the league’s more tight-lipped orga­ni­za­tions, kept the secret about who they were going to take with the top pick so well that even Banchero wasn’t sure he’d be tak­en No. 1 enter­ing Thursday.

Banchero knew he had a chance.

But he said it wasn’t until his agent Mike Miller, the for­mer NBA play­er who the Mag­ic draft­ed with the No. 5 pick out of the Uni­ver­si­ty of Flori­da in 2000, told him “con­grat­u­la­tions” 30 sec­onds before Sil­ver took the stage did he know he’d be the top pick.

“[Miller] was just telling me to stay ready and be pre­pared,” Banchero said. “It hap­pened pret­ty fast…It prob­a­bly took me 20–30 min­utes to real­ly calm down. I was just so filled with emotions.”

The whirl­wind didn’t stop there.

Inter­views with nation­al media out­lets took place between Thurs­day night and Fri­day morn­ing before tak­ing flight for Orlando.

It was when Banchero was along­side Caleb Hous­tan, who the Mag­ic draft­ed at No. 32, coach Jamahl Mosley and pres­i­dent of bas­ket­ball oper­a­tions Jeff Welt­man Fri­day after­noon inside the Magic’s inter­view room at Amway Cen­ter did every­thing that tran­spired since Thurs­day resonate.

“I’d say land­ing here is when it kind of real­ly hit me,” Banchero said, “that I’m part of the Mag­ic and that I was the No. 1 pick.”

Added Hous­tan, a 2021 McDonald’s All-Amer­i­can who was a con­sen­sus for­mer 5‑star com­ing out of Montverde Acad­e­my before play­ing one sea­son at the Uni­ver­si­ty of Michi­gan: “A lot of excite­ment hap­pened. A lot of emo­tions. Just real­ly glad I end­ed up here.”

The Mag­ic are equal­ly as hap­py they have Banchero and Houstan.

“From Day 1 we’ve con­stant­ly talked about IQ, char­ac­ter, ver­sa­til­i­ty, win­ning mind­set with our guys,” Mosley said. “[Banchero] fits all of those things and more. The char­ac­ter of the guys we have on this team, [Banchero] fits that. Caleb fits that. That’s what we’re build­ing and that’s what we’ll con­tin­ue to build.”

Now the real work begins.

Banchero and Hous­tan will have a cou­ple of weeks to get famil­iar with the orga­ni­za­tion before help­ing the Mag­ic kick off NBA sum­mer league in Las Vegas against the Hous­ton Rock­ets on July 7 in front of a nation­al audi­ence (ESPN).

Sum­mer league runs from July 7–17.

Banchero knows even more atten­tion will be put on him as the No. 1 pick. He’s used to expec­ta­tions. It comes with being a for­mer 5‑star and play­ing at Duke — espe­cial­ly dur­ing coach Mike Krzyzewski’s final season.

While Banchero knows this will be dif­fer­ent, he’s embrac­ing the Mag­ic and the pres­sure that comes with being a draft’s top pick.

“It’s noth­ing I feel like I’m not used to,” he said. “It’s def­i­nite­ly dif­fer­ent. I feel like I dealt with a lot of the same stuff this year. I had a cou­ple of bad games and every­one has their opin­ions and what­not, but you can’t pay atten­tion to that. Peo­ple are going to say what they’re going to say. As long as me and my coach­es are on the same page, we’ll fig­ure it out. I’m not wor­ried about what’s being said on the outside.”

If there’s any­one close to Banchero who under­stands what it takes to start a career well, it’s his agent.

Miller won the 2001 Rook­ie of the Year with the Mag­ic to kick off a 17-year NBA career.

“He’s just told me from the begin­ning how great of a place Orlan­do was, how much he liked it, how he still has great rela­tion­ships here,” Banchero said of Miller, who spent his first three sea­sons in Orlan­do. “He enjoyed his time here and I’m just blessed to be here. It’s fun­ny how it all worked out.”

Miller, whose agency LIFT Sports Man­age­ment also rep­re­sents Mag­ic guard R.J. Hamp­ton, called Banchero a “foun­da­tion­al piece”.

“They did a lot of due dili­gence on him,” Miller said. “Guys like Pao­lo don’t work through the door very often. He makes the whole team bet­ter. Clear­ly, he’s the best play­er in this draft. He’s about to show it.”

This arti­cle first appeared on OrlandoSentinel.com. Email Kho­bi Price at khprice@orlandosentinel.com or fol­low him on Twit­ter at @khobi_price.

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