Raptors starting to turn things around

Toronto defeated the Magic earlier in the season and has won three of the last four meetings. Orlando has also dropped three straight and four of its last five north of the border.

On Tuesday, Mike James poured in 28 points and Chris Bosh scored 27 along with 12 rebounds to lead Toronto to a 108-97 comeback victory over Atlanta at Philips Arena.

The Raptors rallied from an 11-point deficit late in the third quarter and netted the final 11 points of the night to record their fifth win in their last seven games.

Morris Peterson had 11 of his 13 points in the fourth quarter to help spur the rally for surging Toronto, which had opened the season with nine straight losses and had just one win through its first 16 games.

The teams were deadlocked at 97-97 heading into the final two minutes, but Peterson buried a baseline three-pointer to put the Raptors in front. After Al Harrington missed a triple with 1:15 to go, Toronto’s Darrick Martin drained a three with 53.4 seconds remaining to extend the lead to six.

Joe Johnson misfired on a three-point try on the other end, and Peterson and James each hit two foul shots in the closing seconds to put the game away.

Three of Toronto’s nine wins this season have come against lowly Atlanta.

The Raptors, who will also host Houston and New Jersey on this stand, are 2-12 in their arena this season.

Toronto holds the current NBA streak of consecutive games with a three-pointer at 563 and counting, spanning through seven seasons. The last time the Raptors did not record a triple was February 24, 1999 at Indiana.

The Miami Heat hold the NBA record with 594 games.