With All-Stars DeMar DeRozan and Kyle Lowry struggling with their strokes, the Toronto Raptors received a timely shot in the arm from their big man.  
Jonas Valanciunas had 11 of his 15 points in the fourth quarter and overtime along with 12 rebounds as the Raptors beat the visiting Miami Heat 96-92 on Thursday to knot their Eastern Conference semifinal playoff series at one game apiece.
“It was just him being hungry going after the ball,” DeRozan said of the Lithuanian centre. “He’s definitely the reason why we won the game tonight.”
DeMarre Carroll scored a game-high 21 points, DeRozan had 20 and Lowry netted 18 for the second-seeded Raptors, who rebounded from Tuesday’s 102-96 game one overtime loss.
Toronto won despite DeRozan and Lowry hitting a combined 16-of-46 field goals.
“We can harp on the negative and beat that drum to death all day but we’re finding other ways to win and that’s encouraging,” Raptors coach Dwane Casey said. “Hopefully, DeMar and Kyle will get their rhythm.”
Miami led 77-70 midway through the fourth quarter but went cold and fell behind before a Goran Dragic 3-pointer with 10.6 seconds left in regulation sent the game into overtime knotted at 86-apiece.  
Unlike the opener when the Raptors went scoreless for the first 3:46, they opened the extra five-minute session on a 6-0 burst behind baskets by DeRozan and Valanciunas, and two Carroll free throws for a 92-86 lead.
A Luol Deng dunk with 23.5 seconds left got the Heat on the board 92-88. But two Corey Joseph free throws extended the Raptors’ lead to 94-88 with 22.1 ticks left, that wrapped up the victory.
“We were conscious of knowing how the last overtime went,” DeRozan said. “We told our guys what we had to do this time around to get a win. And that’s what we did.”   
Dragic scored 20 points, Dwyane Wade and Joe Johnson added 17 apiece for the sloppy Heat, who committed 21 turnovers resulting in 24 Raptors points. Hassan Whiteside finished with 13 points and as many rebounds.
“I don’t think we did a good job at all of executing in overtime,” said Wade. “I thought our offence was poor. In a sense, we feel like we gave one up.”
Wade is well aware the Heat blew a golden chance to steal both road games and grab a commanding 2-0 series lead.
“We had an opportunity, that’s all you want,” he explained. “We put ourselves in a great position. We needed to be locked in. We need to play better going home.” The best-of-seven series shifts to Miami for today’s Game 3.