The Magic will have a healthy roster when they take the court for the opener of their first-round playoff series against the second-seeded Raptors.
Forward Jonathan Isaac had been dealing with concussion-like symptoms, missing Orlando’s regular-season finale against the Hornets on Wednesday where his team secured the seventh seed in the Eastern Conference with a 122-114 victory. But the Magic announced Thursday Isaac has cleared the concussion protocol and will be available for Game 1 in Toronto on Saturday.
Jonathan Isaac has completed and passed the NBA concussion protocol and is available to play Saturday in Game 1 of the Orlando Magic's playoff series against the Toronto Raptors.
— Orlando Magic PR (@Magic_PR) April 12, 2019
The belief is Isaac suffered the injury Sunday during the first quarter of Orlando's 116-108 victory over the Celtics when he was struck in the jaw. He remained on the court after the hit but left the game with 5:38 remaining in the third quarter and did not return.
The Magic were uncertain how long he would be sidelined as the concussion protocol can sometimes take weeks for a player to clear.
“It’s a process. They have to do a bunch of stuff,” coach Steve Clifford said Thursday (via the Orlando Sentinel). “So you don’t know until the end. You have no idea until they clear him.”
Isaac, selected by Orlando with the sixth overall pick out of the 2017 draft, has averaged 9.6 points while shooting 42.9 percent from the field. He played in 75 of the team's 82 games during his second season in the league, a significant jump after being limited to 27 appearances last year because of a lingering ankle injury.
The Magic will also have leading scorer and rebounder Nikola Vucevic back on the court after he missed Wednesday's game with a stomach virus. Vucevic indicated Thursday he was feeling better and expects to play Saturday.