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It was an All-Star matchup on Friday night at the Rose Garden: LeBron James vs. Brandon Roy.

Roy was good, but James was better.

James scored 31 of his game-high 41 points in the first half as the Cavaliers edged out the Trail Blazers 106-94. Roy led Portland with 34 points of his own, but the real story was the hot shooting of James, who scored 20 points in the first quarter alone.

“LeBron was just unbelievable,” said Blazers coach Nate McMillan after the game. ”You normally don’t make adjustments in the first quarter. His 20 points came so fast.”

James was a perfect 8-8 from the field in the opening quarter, including 2-2 from the three-point line.

“They weren’t running isolation plays for him in the first quarter,” said McMillan. “He was just making shots.”

James continued to make shots at an impressive rate in the second quarter and went into halftime with 31 points on 10-12 shooting.

His team was up 64-49 at that point, even though no Cavalier besides James had scored more than eight points.

The 25-year-old superstar seemed to be on a mission after shooting just 12-28 in the Cavaliers loss to the Nuggets on Friday.

“Just wanted to be aggressive,” said James. ”You have to be that way on the road in order to get road wins.”

Things went better for the Blazers in the second half. It started with their improved defense on James, who scored just 10 points on 3-7 shooting after halftime.

“I think Martell (Webster) did a good job in the second half of trying to deny the basketball, making his shots tougher,” said Roy.

Roy scored nine points in the third to help the Blazers outscore the visitors 29-18 in the quarter.

Webster added eight points of his own, including two-straight three-pointers in the middle of an 11-0 Portand run late in the period.

Thing got even closer in the fourth.

The Blazers tied the game at 87-87 on a three-pointer by Roy midway through the final quarter, but from there the Cavaliers took care of business, outscoring their opponents 13-12 over the next five minutes to break the game open for good.

Roy scored 19 points on 8-13 shooting in the second half and was the main reason the Blazers were able to make the game interesting after halftime.

“Brandon Roy had a heck of a game,” said Cavs coach Mike Brown. ”He was tough the entire night. He did a whale of a job keeping those guys in it.”

The Blazers have been relying on more and more perimeter scoring from Roy since they lost their top two centers, Greg Oden and Joel Pryzbilla, to season-ending injuries. Without Oden and Pryzbilla in the lineup, the Cavaliers looked to get Shaquille O’Neal the ball in the post.

Because of the injuries, Juwan Howard, who is just 6-foot-9, was forced to guard O’Neal for much of the game. He resorted to fouling the 37-year-old center several times, resulting in five fouls for the former Michigan star.

O’Neal finished with 11 points and 11 rebounds, his fifth double-double of the season.

“I thought Shaquille was terrific for us,” said Brown. ”He didn’t get a ton of shots because they were fouling him right away and then also double teaming him.”

O’Neal and the Cavaliers have stated all season that their ultimate strength is their defense. They showed why late in the game, holding the Blazers to just 16 points in the final period.

“It was difficult because we made a big run there in the second half and the energy was there in the building,”said Roy. ”Again, they did a good job of slowing us down.”