HOUSTON -- With their season-long, six-game road trip mercifully coming to an end on Friday night, the Cleveland Cavaliers recognized the need for one determined push through the finish line, and they proved willing to deliver whatever effort was required to cap their long jaunt with vigor.

Cavaliers guard Kyrie Irving and forward LeBron James shared the load carrying a sporadic offense but Cleveland relied on its defensive might to rebound from its first loss this month with a suffocating 91-77 victory over the Houston Rockets at Toyota Center.

Cleveland (28-10) limited the Rockets to a season-low point total while Houston (21-20) shot just 35.1 percent (26 for 74) from the floor, including 6-for-25 shooting from behind the 3-point arc. James (19 points, seven rebounds, seven assists) and Irving (23 points) were sufficiently efficient while forward Kevin Love chipped in a double-double (11 points, 13 rebounds), but Cleveland closed its roadie 5-1 by digging in defensively, especially against Rockets guard James Harden.

"We came in with the mindset that we had to defend, we had to cut the head off the snake, and that's Harden, and then just try to defend everyone else at the same time," James said. "And we did that."

Harden scored just 11 points on 2-of-10 shooting. He missed all five of his 3-point attempts and committed eight of the Rockets' 19 turnovers. He seemed resigned to his fate, taking just three shots in 18 second-half minutes as Cleveland sent multiple bodies his direction defensively.

But Harden wasn't alone in his struggles. Excluding point guard Patrick Beverley, who shot 5 of 8, every member of the Rockets' starting lineup missed more shots than they took. Forward Terrence Jones and guard Marcus Thornton combined to shoot 2-for-16 in reserve. Houston reserves combined for six points through the third quarter.

"We stuck to the game plan," Irving said. "We didn't want a talented guy like James Harden to beat us. We wanted their other guys to beat us and we forced him to pass off to other guys and we trusted our weakside rotation."

Said Beverley: "They came out and had a game plan they executed. They defended, they put two on the ball, they really locked down defensively, so you've really got to give credit to them."

The Rockets, whose five-game winning streak came to a halt, fashioned a hopeful start, opening the game with 5-of-6 shooting while darting to a 13-4 lead. But the Cavaliers answered with a trio of 3s to whittle the deficit to 16-13 before turning up the intensity defensively and getting a boost from little-used veteran center Anderson Varejao.

Varejao finished a plus-15 in just seven minutes and his energy proved infectious. The Rockets, meanwhile, closed the period missing 15 of their final 17 shots and surrendered the lead for good when Cavaliers guard Matthew Dellavedova beat the buzzer with a floating jump shot off a Harden turnover for a 23-21 Cleveland edge entering the second.

The Cavaliers did not relinquish that advantage. Following a quiet six-minute stretch in the first quarter, Irving came alive with nine points on 4-of-5 shooting in the second. He opened the period with a pull-up jumper before adding seven consecutive points to extend the Cleveland lead to 36-28 with 6:35 remaining in the half. The Rockets, meanwhile, kept sputtering offensively, closing the second 4-for-12 from the floor with nine turnovers to further undermine their offense.

"Their defense was active, it was tight, it was together," Rockets interim coach J.B. Bickerstaff said of the Cavaliers. "We got opportunities I thought; we didn't make shots. Shots that I thought were open and good shots for us. We didn't knock them down, and I think if we make some of those shots, it changes the way they have to defend you."

NOTES: Cavaliers coach David Blatt said he considered resting F LeBron James on the second night of a back-to-back and the conclusion of a six-game, 10-day road trip but determined that James felt strong enough to play. "I talked to him to see how he was feeling and also felt that he was OK," Blatt said. ... Rockets interim coach J.B. Bickerstaff is the son of longtime NBA coach Bernie Bickerstaff, currently an assistant to Cavaliers general manager David Griffin. When asked if his father had gained any advantage by having his son coach the opposition, the younger Bickerstaff quipped, "One thing about him is I don't tell him that much." ... Rockets G Patrick Beverley returned to the lineup after missing Wednesday night's game due to a family health matter.