The San Antonio Spurs showed their class, delivering a fourth quarter knockout punch to put away the Toronto Raptors 111-100 on Wednesday, underlining their status as the NBA's top team.

Trailing 84-81, the Spurs opened up the fourth quarter with a 15-4 run and never looked back easing to their fourth straight win and improving their record to an NBA best 44-8.

"We're one of the better teams in the league at this point but there are several teams better than us even though our record is better," Spurs coach Gregg Popovich said. "They (Raptors) gave us all we could handle.

"They put us in a lot of situations where it really hurt us defensively and we finally caught up with it in the fourth quarter and held them to 16 and that was the game."

DeJuan Blair paced the Spurs, matching a career high with 28 points and 11 rebounds, while George Hill chipped in with 18 off the bench and Tim Duncan and Tony Parker each added 16.

Andrea Bargnani had a game-high 29 points in a losing effort for the Raptors, who absorbed their 15th loss in 16 games.

With All-Star forward Chris Bosh leaving Toronto to join LeBron James in Miami, the Raptors have suffered the same fate as the Cleveland Cavaliers, plunging to the bottom of the Eastern Conference standings.

While a record 26-game losing streak has left the Cavaliers in the East basement, the Raptors are not far ahead in 14th place.

The Spurs have had troubles on their trips north, losing their previous two visits to Toronto and looked in danger again when the Raptors regained the lead late in the third.

But Toronto could not hold on as the Spurs stepped on the gas in the final quarter outscoring the Raptors 30-16.

The burly Blair grabbed the spotlight from his illustrious teammates Duncan, Parker and Manu Ginobili in the fourth hitting for 16 of his 28 points.

"I play hard, I know there are people way more talented than me," said Blair. "I'm one of the shortest centers in the league but at the same I've got one of the biggest hearts in the league.

"We got enough players to run plays for, I'm just out there to rebound and do all the dirty work."

Reuters

(China Daily 02/11/2011 page22)