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CLEVELAND, Ohio: LeBron James scored 32 points to lead the Cleveland Cavaliers to their 12th straight NBA victory, 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," Cavs coach Mike Brown said. "It's something, hopefully, we can change for this next game, especially with Orlando coming in."
Cleveland host Orlando on Thursday 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.
The Nets trimmed the deficit to as little as four points late in the third priod, 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."
- AFP/yb
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