Raptors down 3-0 in series
Raptors on wrong end of 115-94 victory against Cavs
The fight was back. DeMar DeRozan was back. All that was missing was an even average night from behind the arc.
Alas that was not to be and the Raptors wound up on the wrong end of a 115-94 defeat and are now just a game away from a second four-game sweep in the past three years.
Had they got even an average night from behind the line the Raptors might be a game away from tying this series up.
Instead a 2-for-18 night from distance ruined an otherwise solid showing for three quarters by a Raptors team that was playing without its starting point guard.
The game began with a bit of bad news from a Raptors’ perspective when Kyle Lowry, who looked to have made a stunningly quick recovery from an ankle injury had his night end in the pre-game warm ups when he abruptly left the court and headed to the locker room.
The Raptors were prepared for this but the feeling all day seemed to be that Lowry was at least going to be able to help a little.
As the teams leading three-point shooter at 41 per cent through the regular season, even with a bad ankle Lowry probably would have helped had he been able to play.
There was a real chance for the Raptors in this one. Through three quarter LeBron James was not the same LeBron James that owned the court in Cleveland through those first two games but he didn’t need to be, not when the Raptors couldn’t find any offence other than that which DeMar DeRozan produced.
DeRozan got some personal redemption after having to sit for two days and stew on that fivepoint effort in Game 2 going off for 37 but without some help elsewhere it just wasn’t enough.
And without the win the redemption obviously wasn’t very satisfying.
The Raptors actually missed the first 12 three-pointers they attempted not seeing one go down until Norm Powell took the lid off the basket with a make on attempt No. 13 by the team. That came midway through the third quarter The Raps would only get one more the rest of the night settling for two for the entire night on 15 attempts.
That lack of success only hurt more when the Cavs used their own three-ball proficiency to break the game open late in the third as Kyle Korver got hot for about two minutes and sank three triples in a row.
Through three quarters this one stayed close. On the Raptors side of the ledger DeRozan was a one-man scoring threat with 36 through three while the Cavs spread it around a little more led by 21 from James but with 16 each from Kevin Love and Kyrie Irving.
It was in the fourth that James finally started to look like the James from the first two games going off for nine points in the first six minutes of the quarter as the Cavs started to pull away for good.
James would finish with 35 points on 9-of-16 shooting to go along with eight rebounds and seven assists further taking whatever wind was left in the Raptors’ sails.
For the game Cleveland made 13 of its 23 three-point attempts meaning not even DeRozan’s big night made much of a difference.
Give DeRozan credit for being much more aggressive and forceful but he desperately needed another big night out of one of his teammates offensively to make it meaningful.
J.R. Smith, the primary defender on DeRozan through the first two games when DeRozan struggled got into some early foul trouble just because DeRozan was so aggressive.
With 36 through three quarters DeRozan sat down to begin the fourth and normally doesn’t get the call back in until at least the half way mark of the final quarter.
With nary a semblance of any offensive output without him on the floor, Dwane Casey put up the bat signal for DeRozan after just a two-minute rest.
DeRozan wound up playing 41 minutes and sat down with the game out of reach with three to go.
The 3-0 hole the Raptors find themselves in is the first since they were victims of a sweep two years ago in the first round in Washington. Avoiding the sweep this time around will be no less of a chore.