AUBURN HILLS, Mich. -- The easy part ended for the Detroit Pistons on Wednesday. If they want to make their first playoff appearance in seven seasons, they will have to finish their drive against tough competition.

Led by All-Star Andre Drummond's 30 points and 14 rebounds, the Pistons stretched their winning streak to four games by thumping the Orlando Magic 118-102 at The Palace. Each victory came against teams with losing records. They face clubs that are at or above .500 in all but one of their final 10 remaining games.

"When you're making a playoff push and you say, 'What are the games you have to win?' It was the last four games," Pistons coach Stan Van Gundy said. "You've got to get them. We struggled at times but we got all four. Now, we're going to play a lot of teams ahead of us in the standings."

The Pistons (38-34) moved a game ahead of Chicago, which lost to New York on Wednesday, for the eighth and final playoff spot in the Eastern Conference. With so many games remaining against playoff-bound teams, starting with red-hot Charlotte on Friday, they can't feel the least bit comfortable with their position.

"You look at the four teams fighting for the last two spots, we have by far the hardest schedule," Van Gundy said. "It's not even close. We've got a lot of work ahead to get in."

It would certainly help if Drummond can continue to finish strong. He enjoyed his second-highest scoring game of the season and came up three points shy of his career high. Drummond had a game-winning tip-in against Milwaukee on Monday after getting benched earlier in the second half.

"The guys did a good job of looking for him," Van Gundy said. "I thought he put more into the game tonight and played with better energy."

Tobias Harris, playing his first game against his former team since Orlando traded him last month, supplied 18 points as seven Pistons reached double figures in scoring. He is averaging 16.7 points in 18 games since the swap and can't wait to see what the near future brings.

"It's a big challenge for us," he said. "We're really going to find out a lot about ourselves in this stretch."

Reggie Jackson surpassed the 4,000-point mark while scoring 16 points and handing out nine assists for Detroit (38-34).

Marcus Morris contributed 15 points, five rebounds and four assists to the winning cause. Darrun Hilliard, a second-round draft pick last summer, added 11 points, six rebounds and three assists in his first career start.

The Pistons defense tightened in the second half, holding the Magic to 32.7 percent shooting from the field. Detroit had allowed five of its last seven opponents to shoot over 50 percent.

"We've still got a lot that we can improve on with our defense," said backup center Aron Baynes, who chipped in 13 points. "That's something we really need to lock in over these next few games with the teams we've got coming in."

Elfrid Payton recorded his third career triple-double and first of the season with 20 points, 10 rebounds and 10 assists for the Magic (26-42), who have lost five straight and nine of their last 11.

Payton was hardly in a mood to celebrate his personal achievement.

"They just had everything going. We didn't cut their water on anything," he said. "They had the three-ball going and Drummond was rolling to the lane."

Orlando is assured of having its fourth straight losing season. Its most recent winning campaign was 2011-12, the last season Van Gundy coached the Magic.

"We just really struggled to guard them," Magic coach Scott Skiles said. "Right from the beginning of the game, we had a lot of miscommunications, missed coverages. Pretty much everything that could go wrong for us defensively did."

Aaron Gordon tossed in 15 points and grabbed 11 rebounds for Orlando.

NOTES: Pistons SG Kentavious Caldwell-Pope and one of his backups, Reggie Bullock, were sidelined by illnesses. "It was a little bit ironic for Reggie Bullock because we decided if KCP's out, he would be the starter," Detroit coach Stan Van Gundy said. "It would have been his first start of the year and then he gets sick on the same day." ... Magic C Nikola Vucevic missed his 10th consecutive game with a right groin strain. ... Detroit All-Star C Andre Drummond reached a career high on Monday with his 58th double-double. Isiah Thomas, who had 65 double-doubles in 1984-85, is the only Pistons player with more double-doubles in a season since 1983-84. ... The Magic have played 20 games decided by five points or less, going 7-13. ... The Pistons won the last four meetings. The teams face each other once more on April 6 in Orlando.