Vince Leads Raptors By Magic

Vince Carter had a career-high night dishing off the ball as the Toronto Raptors ridded themselves of their losing streak.

Carter had 30 points and a career-high nine assists as the Raptors snapped a three-game skid with a 108-102 victory over the Orlando Magic on Wednesday night.

"My goal is always to get nine assists every night, believe it or not," said Carter, who's averaging 3.6 assists and 23.7 points per game. "That means more to me (than the 30 points). It feels good and even better to get the win."

"We have a number of veterans on this team and when things aren't going too well, you can't always rely on the younger guys," said Bogues, a 12-year veteran who was two points shy of his career high. "We had three games that we let get away and we have to stop that."

Tracy McGrady added 16 points off the bench.

Tariq Abdul-Wahad had a season-high 23 points, including 14 in the third quarter, as the Magic extended their losing skid to four games. Michael Doleac added 20 points and Ben Wallace had a game-high 10 rebounds.

Carter gave the Raptors a 94-93 lead with 4:17 remaining when he nailed a fadeaway jumper. A minute later, he passed out to Bogues after facing a double team for a jumper that made it 96-93.

"I told Muggsy I have the most confidence in his jump shot," Carter said. "If he stops in the right spot where I ca see him, he'll get a lot more shots and I'll get a lot of assists."

Orlando had trouble holding onto the ball all night and turned it over 27 times, led by seven from Darrell Armstrong.

"We're really out of sync. We just have to do a better job," Armstrong said. "Toronto used our turnovers to score points."

After Antonio Davis missed his second free throw with 44.8 seconds left to make it 99-95, Armstrong accidently knocked the loose ball out of bounds.

Bogues then went 9-of-10 on free throws in the last minute to put the game away.

"Toronto has been struggling offensively and Muggsy Bogues hit some shots. You knew he'd hit free throws down the stretch," Orlando coach Doc Rivers said. "I don't think we can ever win turning the ball over 27 times. We literally threw the game away."

The Magic led for most of the early going until Carter fed an alley-oop pass to McGrady 2:17 into the second quarter to give the Raptors a 32-31 lead. On the next Orlando possession, Carter stole the ball and dished off to McGrady again for an easy layup.

"We did a good job of using (Carter) as bait and getting the double team so he could move the ball around," Raptors coach Butch Carter said. "Vince was making open shots early so they had to go to the double team."

Anthony Parker finally pulled Orlando even with 6:05 left in the game when his long jumper tied the score 90-90.

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