Among the wealth of literature on distance learning during the COVID-19 pandemic, teachers’ endeavors to meet students’ basic psychological needs remains under-explored. This study aims to fill this void by scrutinizing how teacher practices trigger motivating and demotivating experiences on the part of students through Self-Determination Theory (SDT) as analytical lens. Five freshmen taking 11 to 12 online courses in English Education Department at a public university participated in this narrative case study, which was initiated in the initial phase of the pandemic. They were encouraged to write their retrospective narratives and invited to a focus group discussion to appraise their learning experiences. Thematic content analysis revealed that the students experienced an array of motivating and demotivating learning experiences as a result of their teacher practices. Guided by 5Ts (Teacher, Teaching Methodology, Text, Task, and Test) of motivation and SDT, the analysis revealed that the motivating experiences arose when teachers successfully addressed students’ needs for autonomy, relatedness, and competence. In contrast, the failure to meet these needs was identified as the resource of demotivating experiences. The findings shed light on crucial instructional strategies for quality online education, particularly beyond pandemic.