Darius Garland scored a season-high 40 points, and the Cleveland Cavaliers beat the Toronto Raptors 132-126 for their 12th straight win.
Max Strus’ corner 3-pointer answered Gradey Dick’s reverse layup and put the Cavaliers back ahead for good with 5:21 left in the fourth quarter.
The Raptors got within 126-124 on RJ Barrett’s 12-foot floater with 2:00 to play, but Garland answered with a step-back 3-pointer, and the Raptors got no closer.
Garland’s 2 free throws with 19.6 seconds left made it 131-124 and put it away.
During clutch time, the Cavaliers outscored the Raptors 11-5. Garland (No. 8 in clutch points, 2024-25) scored 8 of the Cavaliers’ 11 on 3 for 5 shooting and 1 for 1 at the line. In the fourth quarter, Garland had 2 steals, one of them leading to Caris LeVert’s driving layup that put the Cavaliers ahead 116-115, and the Cavaliers scored 4 points off them.
Evan Mobley had 21 points, 11 rebounds and 6 assists. Mobley and LeVert set each other up for 6 baskets and 16 points, 2 of them in the fourth quarter.
For the Raptors, Scottie Barnes had 24 points (14 in the paint), 10 rebounds, 8 assists and 3 steals, and Chris Boucher added 23 points (15 on 5 3-pointers) and a season-high 12 rebounds off the bench. Barrett scored 20 points. Jakob Poeltl had 17 points, 6 assists and 3 steals on 8 for 10 shooting. The Raptors had 3 20-point scorers and 7 players in double-digit scoring.
The Raptors gave up 16 offensive rebounds, about 4 more than usual for the shots the Cavaliers missed.