TORONTO -- Dwane Casey saw it as a sign of maturity on the part of his young team. After a first half in which he thought "the lid was on the basket," the Toronto Raptors coach watched his squad mount a second half surge to defeat the Cleveland Cavaliers 98-91. "Thats another step in our growth," Casey said after Friday nights win at Air Canada Centre. "Last year at this time, if wed have missed shots like that wed have caved in. "But we kept grinding it, grinding it, grinding it and thats what you have to do when the shots arent falling." The Raptors (30-25) shot a woeful 32.7 per cent from the field in the first half and trailed 44-39. But, with second-year centre Jonas Valanciunas leading the way, Toronto shot an impressive 16-for 23, or 69.5 per cent, in the third quarter on the way to winning their fourth game in five starts. "We said we need to pick it up, we need to come out with energy," Valanciunas, who finished with 18 points and eight rebounds, said of the talk in the locker room at halftime. "Thats what it was all about. "We shot really bad the first half but we did a better job the second half and thats what matters." Valanciunas scored 10 of his 14 second-half points in the third quarter, including five in a row during a 4:07 stretch that saw the Raptors turn a one-point deficit into a 10-point lead. Second-year guard Terrence Ross had a team-high 20 points as the Raptors snapped the Cavaliers (22-34) six-game winning streak and widened their lead to 3-1/2 games over the idle Brooklyn Nets atop the NBAs Atlantic Division. With the win, the Raptors equalled the third-fastest time theyve reached the 30-win mark in team history, just one game off the best mark of 54 games in both the 2009-10 and 2007-08 seasons. The Raptors, who have missed the playoffs in each of the past five seasons, didnt win their 30th game until their 78th outing last year. Although Ross led the Raptors in scoring, it was his defensive play against Cleveland guard Kyrie Irving, who was named MVP of last weekends NBA All-Star Game, that drew rave reviews from his teammates. "Defensively, hes always been impressive, and hes getting better," Toronto guard Kyle Lowry said after Irving was held to 3-for-16 shooting on his way to 17 points. "I told him that on the bench tonight." Lowry had 14 points, nine assists and six rebounds. DeMar DeRozan added 14 points and five assists. Clevelands Luol Deng led all scorers with 21 points and added 11 rebounds while Tristan Thompson of Brampton, Ont., added 13 points and nine assists and Anthony Bennett, also from Brampton, who last spring became the first Canadian to ever go first overall in the NBA draft, had nine points in his first game here. "We just had to pick up our defensive intensity," Ross said of the message delivered at halftime. "The biggest thing, we were coming out, playing too lackadaisical and we had to pick that up." Toronto outscored Cleveland 37-21 in the third quarter to take control. Valanciunas made a layup with 7:22 to go in the quarter to put the Raptors up for good at 53-52. After Valanciunas and Amir Johnson combined for just four points in the first half, Casey said he gave the big men "a wake-up call" going into the second half and they responded at both ends of the court. "We reminded them theres more to the game than the offensive end," Casey said. "You can get rebounds. You can get back in transition. You can challenge shots and you can go vertical. "You can do a lot of different things other than make shots and I thought the second half (they) worked at it and got it done." Adidas NMD Black And White . "Weve given ourselves now a tougher task," said Carlyle after the Friday practice, the Toronto head coach notably chipper and upbeat throughout. "But the bottom line is we just have to win our share of games [and] not worry about what anybody else is doing. Adidas NMD Black Sale . Ashley Wagner will skate in the womens short program for a U.S. team thats in seventh place. Davis and White won the silver medal at the Vancouver Games and are two-time world champions. http://www.cheapnmdonline.com/wholesale-...race-china.html. Cruz set the tone with a two-run homer in the first inning, and Baltimore scored eight times in the eighth to pull away for a 12-3 victory in Game 1. The major league leader with 40 homers during the regular season, Cruz added an RBI single to his early blast off Max Scherzer. Adidas NMD Womens Cheap . - Doug Kalitta led Top Fuel qualifying Friday in the NHRA Nationals at Maple Grove Raceway with a 3. Adidas NMD Discount .And although FIFAs investigators are preparing to release the findings of a World Cup corruption probe, Hassan Al Thawadi dismissed any chance of Qatar losing the showpiece event.PHOENIX -- Tony La Russa has never missed the managing part of baseball since retiring in 2011. He did miss the competition and, most particularly, the winning. Thats what drew him back to the big leagues. Bolstering their front office, the Arizona Diamondbacks hired La Russa as their chief baseball officer on Saturday, hoping the Hall of Fame manager can help turn around the team after one of the worst starts in franchise history. "Its the first day I woke up and I felt a difference," La Russa said. "Because for the first time since then youre back with an organization and at the end of the day youre going to be judged by how well your contribution is to the organizations competition. Thats how I grew up." La Russa last worked as a manager in 2011, walking away after leading the St. Louis Cardinals to their second World Series title with him at the helm. He spent time working for Major League Baseball as a special assistant to Commissioner Bud Selig and was itching to get back into baseball on a day-to-day basis, appearing at Diamondbacks games a few times the past few weeks. La Russa will report to Diamondbacks President Derrick Hall and oversee the entire baseball operations department. He will work with general manager Kevin Towers and manager Kirk Gibsoon in shaping the future of the Diamondbacks, who were 16-28 heading into Saturday nights game against the Los Angeles Dodgers.dddddddddddd "It is going to take time, but I think having him here and helping us lead this department, it looks good for us," Hall said. "Any decisions that are going to be made personnel wise, hes going to have final say." La Russa won three World Series titles and six league championships and was a four-time manager of the year in 33 seasons before retiring in 2011. He will be inducted into the Hall of Fame in July and is third with 2,728 wins as a manager and second with 70 post-season wins. La Russa played parts of six seasons in the majors before starting a managerial career that began in 1979 with the Chicago White Sox and took him to Oakland and St. Louis, where he won World Series rings in 2006 and 2011. He also won a title with the As in 1989, joining Sparky Anderson as the only two managers to win World Series in both leagues. "I understand the levels of decision making," La Russa said. "And all Im saying here is that you include everybody in the process. But I think the advantage that we hope to have is that everybody on the competitive side is working from the same thought philosophy." ' ' '