“It felt real good, finally getting a chance to beat those guys,” Howard said. “The main thing is we played the way we know how to play — run and try to cut the turnovers down. We can beat anybody.”

Immediately after Billups was injured Orlando went on an 18-4 run in under six minutes to take a 24-6 lead, by far its largest of the series to that point. The Magic held a one-point lead in Game 1 and were up by four in Game 2. Nelson scored eight points in the run and had 12 in the first quarter on 4-of-6 shooting.

The Pistons drew within 73-69 at the end of the third quarter despite going nearly four minutes without a field goal. Besides a jumper by Wallace, Stuckey, Hamilton and Prince scored all 27 points for Detroit in the third quarter, while Orlando went 6-of-21 from the field.

“We gave ourselves chances,” Saunders said. “We made a lot of runs after we fell behind.”

Detroit failed to score a field goal in the opening 4:27 of the fourth quarter until Hamilton made a layup. By then the Magic were ahead 87-73 — helped by a Lewis 3-pointer and putback — and the Pistons would get no closer.

“I said when we left the Palace that if we did not get off to a good start and let the crowd get into the game we were going to have to fight back,” Prince said. “We did a good job of fighting back, but against a team that shoots 3s very well you can’t dig yourself in that big of a hole and try and come back.”

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Orlando finally found a way to take care of the ball. The Magic had 11 turnovers, the same as Detroit in Game 3 and a vast improvement over the 19 they committed in Game 2.

Notes: Magic coach Stan Van Gundy joked before the game that Orlando would probably be “the first one under the new rule to have a basket disallowed” if the NBA changed its replay procedures following Billups’ controversial third-quarter 3-pointer on Monday. The league said Tuesday the basket shouldn’t have counted, but the referees had no choice. ... Detroit’s 16 first-quarter points set a 2008 team playoff low, while Orlando’s 30 in the period set a Pistons’ opponent high for a quarter. ... The Pistons were the only playoff team that hadn’t given up 100 points in a game.

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