Rookie Dwyane Wade's go-ahead jumper with 28 seconds left in regulation was the difference Sunday as the Miami Heat held on for a 90-89 victory over Toronto at Air Canada Centre.
"That's a game you like to win, and you need to win," said Wade, who led Miami (8-15) with 23 points. "We just battled the whole way through."
Raptors rookie Chris Bosh, right, fouls Miami's Lamar Odom during first half NBA action in Toronto on Sunday. (CP PHOTO/Aaron Harris)
Brian Grant added 19 and Lamar Odom finished with 17 for Miami.
The loss was Toronto's second straight.
"It's unfortunate to lose a game and I didn't think we played our best basketball in any way," said Raptors coach Kevin O'Neill. "We were in a position to win the game and just couldn't finish it, and that's difficult to swallow."
Donyell Marshall scored 25 points to lead Toronto (13-10), while Vince Carter played just 23 minutes because of a sore left Achilles tendon.
"I knew something was up when I couldn't get warm," said Carter. "If I was worried about it, I wouldn't have played."
Carter, who sat out the entire fourth quarter until the final two minutes, finished with 12 points and had the potential game-winner go in and out with five seconds left on the clock.
"They were not falling for me today," said Carter. "I wasn't getting as much lift off the ground, but that is not an excuse."
Alvin Williams, Jalen Rose and Morris Peterson each had 11 points for Toronto, who are now 5-2 since the blockbuster six-player trade with Chicago on Dec. 1.
"We just didn't finish plays, whether that was offensive rebound, whether it was defensive possessions where we played good defence for X amount of time and probably had a lapse," said Rose. "When you're trying to play winning basketball, you can't afford that."
Carter's bucket at 1:54 gave Toronto an 89-86 advantage but the Raptors couldn't sustain it. Carter missed a shot with 45 seconds left with Toronto hanging onto a 89-88 lead and fell to the floor after an errant elbow from Miami coach Stan Van Gundy hit him in the eye.
"It was not a very hard collision," said Van Gundy. "(Carter) turned around and ran into me. First of all, I'm not very big and I'm certainly not very tough, so I can't imagine it hurt him that bad because I would have gone down."
Miami quickly went to work after the ensuing time-out, as Wade connected to give Miami the lead for good.
Both Williams and Carter missed shots in the final 20 seconds to restore Toronto's lead.
"We had four chances with our best player with the ball," said O'Neill, on Carter's late-game misses. "He looked O.K. today. He didn't look 100 per cent by any stretch of the imagination, but I thought he played all right."
Miami got the job done on the boards, out-rebounding the Raptors by a 49-37 margin and scoring 26 second-chance points compared to Toronto's six.
Toronto travels to Dallas to take on the Mavericks Monday night.
with files from CP Online
