Cavs sweep Raptors to reach third straight conference finals

TORONTO, May 7 (Xinhua) -- The Cleveland Cavaliers ended the Toronto Raptors' season with a 109-102 victory in game four of their Eastern Conference semifinal series on Sunday afternoon.

With the 4-0 series win, Cleveland becomes the first team in NBA history to start the playoffs 8-0 in consecutive seasons. Prior to beating Raptors, the Cavaliers defeated the Pacers in their opening round series. Last season, Cleveland took down Detroit and Atlanta en route to the franchise' s first ever championship.

In Sunday' s game, Cleveland forward LeBron James led the way with a game-high 35 points, grabbed a team-high nine rebounds, and dished out six assists. During this postseason, the 32-year-old is averaging 34.4 points per game and has scored at least 30 points in seven of the team' s eight playoff games.

Cavaliers head coach Tyronne Lue says he has been impressed with the future Hall of Famer since the All-Star break.

"Since the second half of the season, he' s really gone to another level and carried it over to the playoffs, " said Lue following the win. " We' re just riding it right now. The way he' s been playing is phenomenal. He' s carrying the team and everyone is chipping in trying to help him as much as possible. "

During the four games against Raptors, James scored at least 35 points in each game while shooting an efficient 57.3 percent (43-for-75) from the field, 83.3 percent (45-54) from the charity stripe, and 48.1 percent (14-for-27) from the three point line, well above his respective career averages of 50.1 percent, 74.0 percent, and 34.2 percent.

LeBron credits rest and practice for the team's recent success.

"We're healthy," said James after the win. "We got more practice time during the playoffs than we got in the whole month of March because of injuries and being on the road so much. It's benefited our team a lot. "

During the series, Cleveland' s offence averaged 116.3 points a game and defeated Toronto by an average margin of 15.3 points per game. The Cavaliers as a whole made 61 three-pointers during the series, compared to Toronto' s 27.

Despite the consecutive sweeps of Toronto and Indiana, James believes he and his teammates can climb to an even higher level.

"Even though we won this series there are some things we can clean up," James opined. "Offensively things like ball movement throughout the course of the game, getting to our spots a lot sooner and defensively just communicating a bit more, " he added.

James has now reached the Eastern Conference Finals in nine of his 14 seasons in the league. He is vying to capture his fourth NBA Championship. Cleveland will face the winner of the Boston-Washington series.