Raptors on verge of tying Celtics near top of Eastern standings

The Toronto Raptors have been looking up at the host Boston Celtics in the Eastern Conference standings for much of the season, but the Raptors will have a chance to pull even with the Celtics when the teams meet Friday night.

Boston's 114-110 home loss to Denver on Wednesday night, coupled with Toronto's 97-96 victory over Charlotte, moved the Raptors within one game of the Celtics, who occupy third place in the Eastern Conference. Toronto has won five of its last six games and will try to extend its winning streak to four games.

It looked like Toronto would come up short against the Hornets when LaMelo Ball made a layup with 1.6 seconds left that gave Charlotte a 96-94 lead, but Immanuel Quickley connected on a 3-pointer at the buzzer that allowed Toronto to overcome a 10-point fourth-quarter deficit.

The Raptors shot 3 of 27 from beyond the 3-point arc in the first three quarters, but made 4 of their 7 3-point attempts in the fourth.

It was a rough shooting night overall for Quickley, who was 8 of 18 from the field (3 of 11 from 3-point range). He finished with 21 points.

"It's just what the game is, honestly," Quickley said. "This is my sixth year, so you understand that sometimes you literally just don't make shots, and sometimes you cannot miss at all. So you know it has to balance out at some point.

"I wasn't making as many shots as I wanted to, but I said, ‘If I get this, I'm going to try to end it.'"

Brandon Ingram, Toronto's leading scorer (21.8 ppg), was limited to 11 minutes Wednesday after he jammed his thumb early in the first quarter. X-rays were negative. RJ Barrett picked up some of the scoring slack by finishing with 28 points and seven rebounds. He tossed in 16 points in the fourth quarter.

"I've always said that I'm here to do whatever the team needs me to do to win," Barrett said. "So (it was) to make those plays down the stretch."

Like Toronto, Boston has been playing good basketball in recent weeks. Wednesday's loss to Denver ended a four-game winning streak, but the Celtics enter Friday's matchup having won eight of their last 10.

One positive for Boston in the loss was the play of center Neemias Queta, who has been one of the most improved players in the NBA this season. Queta had a career-high 20 rebounds in the loss, including 10 at the offensive end. Boston had 21 offensive rebounds overall, which led to 27 second-chance points.

Queta's 20 rebounds were the most by a Boston player since Jared Sullinger grabbed 20 in a game during the 2015-16 season.

Denver made 20 of its 44 3-point attempts in Wednesday's victory.

"I thought our defense did its job, but they had a good shooting night," Boston's Jaylen Brown (33 points) said. "When a team plays like that, they're tough to beat. And we still had a chance to win the game.

"It's just a few possessions offensively and defensively that we just got to be sharper, but, you know, on any given night teams can get hot like that."

--Field Level Media