LeBron James scored 32 points to lead the Cleveland Cavaliers to their 12th straight NBA victory on Tuesday, a 104-97 triumph over the lowly New Jersey Nets.
The victory gave the Cavaliers the longest winning streak in the NBA this season, to go with the best record in the league at 42-11.
The Nets, who at 4-47 own the league’s worst record, had to make do without point guard Devin Harris, who sat out with a sprained left shoulder.
Courtney Lee led the Nets with 24 points.
James connected on 13-of-21 from the field, with 11 assists and three rebounds.
Jawad Willams scored a career-high 17 points, while Anderson Varejao added 15 for the Cavaliers, but Cavs coach Mike Brown said his team wasn’t dialed in defensively.
“I didn’t think defensively that we were as locked in or as physical as we have been,” Brown said. “It’s something, hopefully, we can change for this next game, especially with Orlando coming in.”
Cleveland host Orlando today in a rematch of last season’s Eastern Conference Finals, which the Magic won in six games.
The Cavaliers scored the last seven points of the first quarter and took the lead for good early in the second quarter.
The Nets trimmed the deficit to as little as four points late in the third period, but Cleveland opened the fourth quarter with a 13-2 scoring run to take control.
While James scored 13 of his points in the final period, he said effective defense was key.
“We got stops in the fourth,” James said. “It wasn’t a switch [we turned on], we just decided to get some stops and it’s good to have that.”
While Cleveland led by as many as 17, the Nets cut the deficit to seven several times in the fourth quarter.
“You know in the first half he’s going to try to get everyone involved and get some guys hot,” Nets center Brook Lopez said of James. “He’s going to come out very assertive in the second half, especially in the fourth quarter, depending on how the game was going. We were sticking around so he definitely had to assert himself.”
■NUGGETS 127, MAVS 91
AFP, DENVER, COLORADO
The Denver Nuggets celebrated Carmelo Anthony’s return from injury on Tuesday with their biggest victory of the NBA season, a rout of the Dallas Mavericks.
Anthony, the NBA’s second-leading scorer, had missed eight straight Nuggets games with a badly sprained left ankle.
“The good thing is my first game back, I didn’t have to do too much, but the bad thing is, I already had been sitting out for two weeks,” Anthony said.
“I wanted to play [more], but I’ll take a 36-point win any day,” he said.
Although they welcomed him back, Denver were without Kenyon Martin, who sat out with tendinitis in his left knee.
The 36-point margin of victory surpassed the Nuggets’ 28-point victories over Toronto and New Jersey, both in November.
Nene led Denver with 21 points, Chauncey Billups added 16 and Chris Andersen had 14 points and 10 rebounds as the Nuggets downed the team they ousted in the playoffs last season. The Nuggets led by 26 at halftime.
“We didn’t expect to beat a good team like that by that amount of points, but we came out and played well from the beginning,” Anthony said. “Everybody got involved. Everybody was on the same page. We knew in the back of our mind how important this game was.”
Dirk Nowitzki led Dallas with 17 points on five-of-17 shooting. Jason Terry had 16 points and Josh Howard added 14 for the Mavericks, who arrived in Denver on Tuesday morning after a victory over Golden State in Oakland, California, on Monday night.
“I’m disappointed, but it was a tough turnaround, difficult situation,” Mavs coach Rick Carlisle said.
■BOBCATS 94, WIZARDS 92
AFP, LOS ANGELES
Raymond Felton drained a shot with 1.9 seconds left to play to lift Charlotte to victory over Washington on Tuesday.
With the triumph, the Bobcats snapped a three-game losing streak.
After a miss by Washington’s Antawn Jamison, the Bobcats got the rebound. They didn’t call a timeout and Felton ended up with the ball, driving to the lane and firing over Randy Foye.
Jamison missed another attempt at the buzzer as the Wizards saw their unexpectedly long spell on the road end with a defeat.
Washington won in Orlando on Friday, but couldn’t get home to host Atlanta on Saturday because of a blizzard on the US east coast.
That game was postponed and the Wizards stayed in Orlando for three extra days before flying to Charlotte.
They learned before Tuesday’s game they were likely to be stranded in Charlotte because of a new snowstorm.
Stephen Jackson scored 22 points for Charlotte. All-Star Gerald Wallace added 17 points and 13 rebounds, Flip Murray and Boris Diaw added 16 points apiece for the Bobcats.
Tuesday’s other results:
• Thunder 89, Trail Blazers 77
• Hawks 108, Grizzlies 94
• Jazz 109, Clippers 99
• Heat 99, Rockets 66
• Bulls 109, Pacers 101
• Pistons 93, Bucks 81
• Kings 118, Knicks 114, OT
• 76ers 119, Timberwolves 97
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The US’ Ilia Malinin on Saturday produced six scintillating quadruple jumps, including a quadruple Axel, in the men’s free skate to capture his first figure skating world title. The 19-year-old nicknamed the “Quad god,” who is the only skater to land a quadruple Axel in competition, dazzled with an array of breathtakingly executed jumps starting with his quad Axel and including a quadruple Lutz in combination with a triple flip and a quadruple toe loop in combination with a triple toe. He added an unexpected triple-triple combination at the end to earn a world-record 227.79 in the free program for a championship
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