Following another awful shooting night in the Miami Heat's Game 4 win over his Toronto Raptors, DeMar DeRozan made a promise. He had struggled all postseason to find the bottom of the net, first due to the defense of Indiana Pacers lockdown artist Paul George, and now due to a thumb injury to his right hand suffered on the final play of Game 1 of the conference semis. But he refused to use the impaired digit as an excuse for his poor play, and vowed to turn things around come Wednesday's Game 5.

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"I know for sure I'm not going to shoot like I did tonight next game," he said. "I know that for a fact. It's just something I'mma deal with, and I'mma push through it."

The All-Star shooting guard kept his word.

DeRozan tied a postseason high with 34 points on 11-for-22 shooting to lead the Raptors to a 99-91 win at Air Canada Centre that gives Toronto a 3-2 lead in this best-of-seven series. They'll now head back to Miami to try to close out the Heat in Game 6 on Friday.

DeRozan persevered despite reinjuring the thumb while reaching in to try to disrupt a pass early in the fourth quarter. He headed back to the locker room for treatment before returning four minutes later and hitting eight straight free throws down the stretch.

"Just jammed my thumb a little bit," he said on the court during a postgame interview with TNT. "I'll be all right."

He sang a slightly different tune a bit later, on the podium.

"It just felt like a blowtorch on my hand," he said. "That's all."

DeRozan got plenty of help in putting the Heat on the brink of elimination from All-Star backcourt partner Kyle Lowry, who has also had a lot of trouble consistently knocking down shots this postseason, but who also shined when the Raptors needed him most on Wednesday.

Lowry wasn't quite as hot as he was in the second half of Game 3, but his energy, playmaking, defensive effort, and all-court excellence was back on full display as he finished with 25 points on 9-for-25 shooting, including a 4-for-9 mark from 3-point land, to go with a game-high 10 rebounds, six assists, three steals, one block and just one turnover.

After combining for just 19 points in an overtime Game 4, Lowry and DeRozan popped for 19 on 6-for-13 shooting in the first quarter alone. DeRozan worked his way into the paint to get some easy layups to go down before stepping out for his more customary midrange looks, while Lowry got untracked thanks to a pair of in-rhythm 3-pointers and a couple of trips to the line, helping the Raptors build an early 16-point lead that they'd never fully relinquish.

"Early on, some of the lack of discipline in terms of allowing them to get some rhythm shots, rhythm free throws, early on in that first quarter — that's a dangerous thing with All-Stars," Heat coach Erik Spoelstra said. "They see the ball going through that net from the free-throw stripe, and now they get a little bit more confident in other areas."

The All-Stars' 59 combined points is the most they've contributed as a duo this postseason, and with Toronto already missing injured rising-star center Jonas Valanciunas and losing starting forward DeMarre Carroll to a left wrist contusion following a collision with Heat point guard Goran Dragic late in the third quarter, those buckets were sorely, sorely needed. (The Raptors said that X-rays on Carroll's wrist came back negative.)

"You know, they're our guys," Raptors coach Dwane Casey said. "We can disparage them all we want to, talk about how bad their shooting is, but again, you don't forget how to score the basketball. It's going to come back. You hope it's within the series, but it's going to come back."

Toronto outscored Miami by 25 points in Lowry's 41 minutes and 26 seconds of floor time, and the Heat outscored the Raptors by 17 points in the 6 minutes and 34 seconds that Lowry got to rest. There are reasons to view individual players' single-game plus-minus numbers with some skepticism, given the lack of overarching lineup context and the infinitesimal sample, but in this case, the numbers matched the eye test. Lowry was that big a difference-maker for the Raptors on Wednesday, and his two-way effort helped tilt the game in the final 75 seconds.

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