ATLANTA — Brian McCann hit a tiebreaking three-run homer in the fifth inning and the Atlanta Braves beat the reeling New York Mets 7-3 on Thursday night for their first seven-game winning streak since 2006.

McCann’s fifth four-RBI game of the season helped the Braves move 10 games over .500 for the first time since May 16, 2007. Atlanta (78-68) is 4« games behind NL wild card-leading Colorado.

New York (63-84) has lost five straight and nine of 10 to fall 21 games under .500 for the first time since Oct. 2, 2004, when it was 70-91. The Mets have 20 fewer wins than at the same point of the 2008 season, when they were 83-64 and in first place in the NL East.

Jair Jurrjens (12-10) worked seven solid innings for Atlanta, allowing two runs, one earned, and six hits, while lowering his ERA to 2.75.

McCann gave the Braves a 5-2 lead with a two-out drive to right for his 19th homer. Nate McLouth and Martin Prado had one-out singles before Nelson Figueroa struck out Garret Anderson, bringing McCann to the plate.

Atlanta had six hits in its four-run fifth, including a run-scoring single by Matt Diaz.

The start of the game was delayed 2 hours, 3 minutes by rain.

Prado also had a two-run double in the third for Atlanta, which finished with 13 hits.

Daniel Murphy collected three hits for New York, including an eighth-inning homer off Eric O’Flaherty. Fernando Tatis had a two-run single in the fourth.

Figueroa (2-6) gave up six runs and nine hits in five innings.

Diaz was hit by a pitch in the second and is tied for second in the National League with 13 total, including nine times since Aug. 17 — a span of exactly one month. He has been hit by four times in the last three games.

The Braves’ last seven-game winning streak came in July 2006, wrapped around the All-Star break. They had not been 10 games over .500 since they were 25-15 on May 16, 2007.