Penny Hardaway recalls his feud with Chuck Daly when he coached the Magic: "You just have to go with the flow to survive"

The Orlando Magic was the last team that the late Chuck Daly coached before retiring. Among the players he handled then was Anfernee "Penny" Hardaway , who had just returned from a knee injury.

Despite being a lockout-shortened season, Hardaway was able to return successfully. He was one of the reasons why the Magic had the best regular season record in the Eastern Conference with the Miami Heat.

Daly knows best

With Daly calling the shots, there was no question that the Magic were in good hands. However, players such as Penny needed to understand that there would be games where some may not get their minutes. One of those moments happened when the Magic faced the Washington Wizards on March 31, 1999.

Mitch Richmond scored 8 of his 16 points in the fourth quarter to help the Wizards fend off the Magic at the time. Juwan Howard was the top scorer of that game with 20 points, 7 assists, and 6 rebounds.

Orlando's offense struggled in that game. Darrell Armstrong and Horace Grant tried to cover the lack of scoring with 15 points and 14 points, but the effort was not enough.

Daly-Hardaway feud

One player who could have helped on the offensive end was Hardaway. Unfortunately, 3rd overall pick of the 1993 NBA Draft scored only 11 points. It's also worth noting that he hardly saw action in the fourth quarter when the Magic tried to rally back into the game. When asked about that benching, the 4-time All-Star did not hold back.

"It doesn't surprise me what coach (Chuck) Daly does," Hardaway said via Reuters. "You just have to go with the flow to survive."

Hardaway and Daly had their issues at the time, both feuding on what role the former should be playing.

The 1990 NBA All-Star head coach wanted Hardaway to be more of a point guard than a shooting guard. That plan did not sit well with Hardaway.

Despite that adversity, Hardaway was having a good season. He averaged 15.8 points, 5.7 rebounds, and 5.3 assists in 38.9 minutes in 50 regular season games. The Magic made the playoffs but lost in the first round to the Philadelphia 76ers in six games.

Daly would retire after that season and stressed that Penny did not influence his decision.

Meanwhile, it would also be Hardaway's last season with the Magic. He would move to the Phoenix Suns with Penny admitting that it was Jason Kidd who successfully sold him the idea of coming to The Valley, per NBA.com .

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