With a 12-minute stretch of horrible defence that broke open a game that had been close, the Raptors saw their season-worst losing streak hit seven in a row with a 95-76 loss to the Detroit Pistons.

And unless they find a way to put together a consistent, four-quarter effort, this ugly streak could become apocalyptic before too long.

"We get down and we just kind of lose confidence in ourselves and stop playing with the energy we need," said coach Jay Triano.

"This team (the Pistons) played with a lot more energy than we had."

Down just three at the half, a series of defensive breakdowns - slow rotations, missed assignments, getting caught up in screens - put the Raptors in a 14-point hole entering the fourth quarter.

In a decisive third quarter, the Pistons shot a blistering 66.6 per cent from the floor, making 12-of-18 field goal attempts as Toronto's defence broke down in every imaginable way.

Things barely improved in the fourth quarter, but that was after the damage had been done in the third as the Pistons won their second straight after losing five in a row.

"When you're not playing very well that's almost a natural reaction," Jermaine O'Neal said of the cumulative effect of error upon error.

"I think it's a product of losing some games in a row. You tend to feel the effects of that in a game like tonight, when you're so close and then 12 minutes later you're so far."

One of the more galling parts of the defeat for the Raptors is that as bad as they looked in the second half, they looked good in the first.

With crisp ball movement, they shot 48 per cent and scored 43 points in the opening two quarters. But the offence died in the second half and they scored just 33 points and shot 36 per cent from the field.

"We didn't move the ball like we're capable of," said Bosh. "We were standing and looking, we were trying to force a couple of plays and possessions and we didn't do what we were doing in the first half."

O'Neal played 20 minutes, scoring 11 points but grabbing only one rebound. He didn't look at all encumbered by the sore knee that had him on the shelf for 10 of Toronto's past 11 games.

"I felt all right," O'Neal said. "A couple of my reads and reactions as far as being quick and moving were a bit slow. We got beat pretty badly, so it's hard to evaluate what you do personally."

And unless things get turned around with consistent effort, getting beaten badly is going to become commonplace.

"We tried to go inside (in the second half) and we couldn't score, we missed our first couple of shots and we got a little deflated," said Triano.

"We didn't fight through it."

Tayshaun Prince, who seems to always have big games against Toronto, led Detroit with 25 points, while the backcourt of Rodney Stuckey and Allen Iverson combined for 28.

And the play of those three more than offset decent efforts from Toronto's Bosh, with 19 points, and Andrea Bargnani, who added 16.

The game marked the NBA debut of Raptor rookie Nathan Jawai, who played the final 3: 05 with no shots, rebounds or points.