Robin Lopez scored a season-high 29 points as the New Orleans Hornets registered a narrow 97-94 victory over the Orlando Magic, to mark their first win after 11 defeats in a row.
Greivis Vasquez finished with 27 points, eight assists and six rebounds, while Ryan Anderson added 15 points and five rebounds. Rookie Anthony Davis had 12 points and 11 rebounds, as the Hornets posted their first win since Dec. 3.
"That comes from my teammates. They look for me. They're giving me looks," the Associated Press quoted Lopez as saying. "We've been scrapping, but it's just one game. We want to string together a few."
For the Magic, Jameer Nelson scored a season-high 28 points and 10 rebounds, while Nik Vucevic contributed with 19 points and nine rebounds.
Anderson, who made four out of 11 attempts from the field, said it felt nice to beat is former team.
"It's huge for us," Anderson said. "Not only is it nice to beat the team that traded me, but it's great for this team.
"It's great for the morale. We've been battling to get a win. We've been fighting to the end. And this was a big step."
The Hornets outscored the Magic 26-24 in the first quarter, but in the second quarter, Orlando added 29 points, while New Orleans could only make 23, giving the Magic a four-point lead at halftime.
Orlando shot above 60 percent in the first half, but overall in the game they made 38 out of 76 attempts from the field.
Arron Afflalo scored 14 points and converted six of the 14 attempts from the floor. J.J. Redick had 12 points, six assists and five rebounds, while E'Twaun Moore finished with 10 points and six rebounds against the Hornets.
The Hornets outscored the Magic in the third quarter 29-23 to take a slender 78-76 lead in the game.
Lopez made two crucial free throws to give his team a 94-93 advantage late on, before seeing off Orlando's challenge in the final seconds to garner a mich-needed win.
"It was playing against set defense compared to getting in transition," Magic coach Jacque Vaughn said. "They were long, blocked some shots of ours and were great at closing out and contesting shots, so I think that was the difference."
The Magic's starting forward Glen Davis was ruled out because of a shoulder injury and the Hornets' offense took advantage of his absence.
"We miss him a lot -- both ends of the court," Vucevic said. "People think it's probably just on the offensive end because he's one of our leading scorers. But he played well on both ends of the court."
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