KYRIE IRVING scored 21 of his season-best 32 points in the fourth quarter of the Cavaliers’ fifth straight victory, 121-115 at the Washington Wizards on Wednesday night.

    While LeBron James had 34 points, Irving scored 10 points in a row in the fourth quarter and showed no ill effects from the injury that ended his 2015 playoffs and postponed his season debut until mid-December. Despite playing in just seven games this season, Irving looks like an All-Star to James.

    “At the end of the day, it doesn’t matter how many games, he’s an All-Star player,’’ James said. ‘’He’s much more than just an All-Star. He’s much better than that. He’s 23 years old, and he hasn’t even scratched the surface yet.”

    Irving had a 25-point game Monday night at home against Toronto. “Those are two pretty big performances after being out for so long,’’ Cleveland coach David Blatt said. “It’s only reasonable to expect that he’s going to go through a process and still have days when he’s better and days when he’s going to have some effect of the many months that he was out. But it sure didn’t look like that tonight.’’

    Irving turned the ball over to Nene early in the fourth quarter, which led to a layup by Ramon Sessions that tied it. Irving then reeled off 10 consecutive points while the Cavaliers’ defense got some timely stops.

    His fourth-quarter performance certainly caught the attention of his teammates, who see how much Irving is improving in the weeks since he returned.

    “It was nuts,’’ said guard J.R. Smith, who hit five 3-pointers and had 25 points. “To do what he’s doing nine or 10 months to get back and still be able to come out there and shake and bake like he’s doing it’s remarkable.’’

    The Wizards had one of their best offensive performances of the season, but their defensive letdowns proved frustrating.

    “We did a bad job of knowing personnel in certain spots of who we wanted to shoot the ball,’’ Wizards forward Jared Dudley said. (SD-Agencies)