The Orlando Magic have climbed the Eastern Conference standings and have a chance to avoid the play-in tournament thanks to a late-season surge.

Orlando enters Friday night’s visit to the Chicago Bulls on a four-game winning streak, its second-longest run of the season.

Magic coach Jamahl Mosley used a starting lineup of Jalen Suggs, Desmond Bane, Franz Wagner, Paolo Banchero and Wendell Carter Jr. for the first time since Dec. 7 during Wednesday’s 132-120 home victory against Minnesota.

Wherever Orlando (44-36) finishes in the standings, players like how the team has rallied ahead of the postseason.

“Nobody wants to see us in a seven-game series,” center Goga Bitadze said. “That’s how we feel. We’ve got to prove it, but we’ve got to take care of business and wherever we end up, go from there.”

With two games remaining, the Magic have clinched a postseason berth and hold a one-game edge on Philadelphia and Charlotte in the race for the No. 7 seed and are one game behind Atlanta for No. 6.

The Nos. 7-10 seeds in each conference will take part in the play-in tournament.

Chicago (31-49), meanwhile, is coming off a two-game road sweep of the NBA-worst Washington Wizards, giving the beleaguered Bulls consecutive victories for the first time since a four-game winning streak from Jan. 18-24.

Tre Jones scored 31 points to key Thursday’s 119-108 victory against the Wizards, including a 12-for-12 effort from the free-throw line.

“We knew they were going to come out and try to get us back from the other night, you know. They answered the bell early, but in the second half, we came out ready to play, hit them in the mouth again and then finished down the stretch,” Jones said.

He has scored at least 20 points in three successive games for the first time in his career.

The Bulls hope to maintain their scoring balance against the Magic. Collin Sexton chipped in 27 points against Washington while Leonard Miller scored a career-best 26 points to go with 11 rebounds.

Chicago this week fired president of basketball operations Arturas Karnisovas and general manager Marc Eversley. The team’s top two scorers, Josh Giddey (strained left hamstring) and Matas Buzelis (lllness), missed Thursday’s game, in which the Bulls dressed just nine players.

Jett Howard (sprained left ankle) and Jonathan Isaac (sprained left knee) will miss Friday’s game for the Magic. Wagner wasn’t listed on the injury report; he injured his left leg in the third quarter against Minnesota but returned to the floor.

“Pretty quickly, though, it all felt normal and we checked everything,” Wagner said. “I think it’s important to be out there and get some confidence and play a couple minutes more.”

Orlando is 7-3 in the past 10 meetings with Chicago, but the Bulls can clinch the season series with a victory. Chicago took a 2-1 edge with a 121-114 home win on Jan. 2 and is trying for consecutive wins against Orlando for the first time since the 2021-22 season.

Sexton is shooting 50% from the floor, including 59.1% from long range, in his past five games vs. the Magic.

–Field Level Media

It’s been four long years since the Toronto Raptors competed in the postseason. To avoid a potential Eastern Conference play-in slot, the Raptors can’t lose to a team that has owned them for nearly as long.

Toronto (45-35), which just beat Miami twice in three days at home, travels to New York to take on the Knicks (52-28) on Friday. The Raptors will close the regular season on Sunday at home against the Brooklyn Nets.

The Raptors have an identical record to the Atlanta Hawks, and the teams sit in fifth and sixth place in the Eastern Conference standings. But the Orlando Magic enter play Friday one game back and could move out of the play-in and into the guaranteed playoffs if everything falls right.

The Raptors, who averaged 32 wins per season over the past three playoff-less campaigns, swept the four-game season series against Miami with a 128-114 victory on Thursday.

Brandon Ingram scored a season-high 38 points to go along with seven rebounds and seven assists. RJ Barrett had 22 points and six rebounds, and Collin Murray-Boyles added 17 points and eight rebounds.

According to the Toronto Sun, Ingram, who leads the Raptors with 21.5 points per game, set a franchise record for most total points in a season by a player in his first year with the team. Ingram, who now has 1,614, passed both Kawhi Leonard (1,596, 2018-19) and then Mike James (1,604, 2005-06).

“We need BI to be aggressive. We need him to be forceful. He did a good job not just scoring. He grabbed seven rebounds, seven assists today,” Raptors coach Darko Rajakovic said. “How aggressive he is and his ability to get to the rim. I think that’s a game-changer.”

With Thursday’s win, Rajakovic joined Dwane Casey, Nick Nurse, Sam Mitchell and Lenny Wilkens as the only Toronto coaches with 100 career wins with the franchise.

One team he has yet to beat, however, is New York. The Knicks have won 12 straight against the Raptors, including four previous meetings this season. New York won each of those contests by double digits.

Coach Mike Brown’s club, which has won four straight overall, was victorious in its sixth straight game at Madison Square Garden on Thursday.

It was a big win, too, as the Knicks took the season series from the Boston Celtics with a 112-106 victory. Josh Hart had 26 points, including two 3-pointers in the final minute, to lead New York.

Jalen Brunson had 25 points and 10 assists, and Karl-Anthony Towns added 16 points and 12 rebounds as the Knicks moved to two games behind Boston for the No. 2 seed in the East with two games to play.

In the process, Brown collected his 52nd victory, the most in one season for a Knicks head coach since the 2012-13 season, and one more than predecessor Tom Thibodeau had in his five seasons at the helm.

“It didn’t register that they had 51 wins (last season) or whatever, and I wasn’t trying to pass what they had last year. I was trying to hopefully help the team improve going into the playoffs and then hopefully make a run at this thing,” Brown said.

–Field Level Media