TORONTO — After back-to-back losses to start their five-game road trip, the Lakers stressed the importance of staying organized offensively after they felt a lack of organization led to their first two defeats.

It was apparent they took lessons from those losses, with the Lakers dominating the short-handed Toronto Raptors for one half in their 131-125 victory on Friday night at Scotiabank Arena.

The Lakers were decisive and purposeful with their spacing. Their actions and movements were crisp. They took care of the basketball.

“Our team in that first half probably played our best half of basketball, and it wasn’t mistake-free,” Coach JJ Redick said. “We talked about that at halftime. It’s as good as we can play offensively.”

But they weren’t as crisp defensively — the less glamorous end of the court — in the second half after entering the third quarter with a 25-point lead (76-51).

The Lakers took their foot off the gas, and the young and scrappy Raptors exploited that, cutting their deficit to 11 (99-88) at the end of the third quarter and to six (104-98) early in the fourth.

But the Lakers’ offense helped their defense, running back-to-back offensive actions that led to Rui Hachimura corner 3-pointers to push the lead back to 12 points.

“It was all execution,” LeBron James said. “We have the ability to have five threats on the court at one time and if the defense shifts, then we make the extra pass and that was a byproduct of that. I was able to hit Rui on the first one for 3, and then D-Lo was able to hit him. I was able to drive-kick to AR on the baseline pass, swing, swing to D-Lo.”

And once the Raptors cut their deficit to nine (115-106), the Lakers returned to that action to get an Anthony Davis and-one layup to go up by 12 and a D’Angelo Russell 3-pointer to take a 123-111 lead with two minutes left.

“It’s a tough action to guard, particularly with LeBron and A.D. in the horns,” Redick said. “Or LeBron as the ball handler and getting a rip screen [back screen] from a smaller player, usually has a smaller defender. Something that we feel like we can go to against certain matchups and usually get good offense out of it.”

They stayed ahead for the remainder of the game to end their losing streak and obtain their first victory of the five-game trip.

The Lakers (4-2) were led by Davis’ season-high 38 points, 12 rebounds, three steals, two blocked shots and two assists.

“We ran a few things for him, but it wasn’t like we featured him,” Redick said. “It’s a testament to how we envision our offense. The ball is going to find the best players. We can certainly put guys in certain positions within our alignments and within our system to exploit their skills, but the ball is going to find A.D. if we play the way we want to play.”

James finished with 27 points, 10 assists and six rebounds.

Austin Reaves had 20 points and six assists and Russell added 19 points and six assists. Reaves played in the second half after rolling his right ankle in the second quarter and briefly going to the locker room.

“First couple minutes after rolling it I was in some pain,” Reaves said. “But I got to come back here, do a little treatment, move around and I felt good.”

Reaves said he plans on being available for Monday’s game against the Detroit Pistons. The Lakers will wrap up the trip against the Memphis Grizzlies on Wednesday.

“I’m going to pull a LeBron, I plan on playing all 82,” Reaves quipped.

The Raptors (1-5) were without Scottie Barnes, Bruce Brown, Immanuel Quickley and Kelly Olynyk.

They were led by RJ Barrett’s 33 points, 12 assists and five rebounds. Gradey Dick had 31 points, seven rebounds and three assists, and Jakob Poeltl had 19 points and 12 rebounds.

The Lakers shot three times as many free throws as the Raptors, going 36 for 41 while Toronto finished 11 for 13.