Longest NBA playoff droughts: How Hornets can snap record with win over Magic
Contention has evaded the Charlotte Hornets since the days of Kemba Walker.
Despite having some solid talent roll through North Carolina, from LaMelo Ball and Kon Knueppel to Gordon Hayward and Terry Rozier, the Hornets have struggled to remain in playoff contention — until, all of a sudden, they’ve surged in the second half of the 2025-26 season.
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Entering Friday’s Play-In Tournament game against the Orlando Magic, all it will take is one Hornets win to break the longest playoff cold spell in the NBA.
Here’s a look at the NBA’s longest playoff drought and the last time the Hornets made the bracket.
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Longest NBA playoff droughts
Because Play-In Tournament berths are not considered a playoff appearance, the Hornets will have to officially make the 2025-26 first round to officially break their drought, which is the longest in the NBA.
Charlotte hasn’t made the playoffs in any of the last nine seasons. Should the Hornets loss to the Magic in the Play-In Tournament, that number would increase to a full decade’s worth of non-playoff seasons.
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However, if the Hornets do make the playoffs, there will be a new longest playoff drought in the NBA owned by the Washington Wizards at five seasons. The last time the Wizards made the playoffs was in 2021, when a Bradley Beal-Russell Westbrook-led squad was taken down by the 76ers in the first round.
The Utah Jazz and Chicago Bulls both last made the playoffs in 2022, while the Brooklyn Nets and Sacramento Kings last made it in 2023.
| Rank | Team | Last Playoff Appearance | Drought (Seasons) |
| 1 | Charlotte Hornets | 2016 | 9 |
| 2 | Washington Wizards | 2021 | 5 |
| T-3 | Utah Jazz | 2022 | 4 |
| T-3 | Chicago Bulls | 2022 | 4 |
| T-5 | Brooklyn Nets | 2023 | 3 |
| T-5 | Sacramento Kings | 2023 | 3 |
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When was the last time the Hornets made the playoffs?
The last time the Hornets made the playoffs was in the 2015-16 season, when Kemba Walker’s 20.9 points per game guided the team to the sixth seed in the Eastern Conference at 48-34.
Charlotte, which was also led by Al Jefferson, Nicholas Batum, Jeremy Lin and Cody Zeller, was matched up against the third-seeded Miami Heat in Round 1, but the Hornets lost in Game 7 when Goran Dragic put up 25 points in a blowout Heat win.
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