No detail is too small during winning streak
First in the East, Raptors know there’s a target on their back
The Toronto Raptors are holding themselves to a higher standard than ever before. A legitimate pursuit of an NBA championship has them more aware of even the slightest slippage.
The Raptors are riding a season-best, nine-game winning streak, yet they are finding minor flaws they want to clean up lest bad habits cost them a game or two when the playoffs start in a little more than a month.
That was the case after a 116102 victory over the Brooklyn Nets on Tuesday night, their seventh straight road triumph.
“We’ve got to start the games with (hard play). Right now, our disposition to start the game is not good,” Raptors coach Dwane Casey told reporters Tuesday, after the Nets scored 40 firstquarter points. “The starters have to come out with a better disposition, a hungrier mentality and understand they’re going to get the best teams’ shots … We can’t play our way into the game and put taxing minutes on our bodies trying to come back.”
Casey’s concern dealt primarily with the fact Brooklyn’s D’Angelo Russell made seven threepointers in the game’s first eight minutes and Toronto trailed by eight after the opening quarter. Still, it’s a bit of a red herring since, in six of the nine wins on the current streak, the Raptors actually led after a quarter and they haven’t trailed by more than eight in any of the other three.
Sometimes it’s the bench unit bailing out sluggish starters in the final four or five minutes of the first quarter; sometimes — like against Houston on Friday night — the starters are dominant. But whichever way, the Raptors have shown the ability to stay in games.
“That’s why we’re starting to start a game out the right way,” point guard Kyle Lowry said. “We got to find ways to just be a little bit more assertive, aggressive and just be a better communicating team. I think that will solve a lot of issues.”
Not that there are a lot. The Raptors, 50-17 and four games clear in the East going into Wednesday’s games, are having a tremendous season by anyone’s standards. But taking the next step — winning their first East crown and playing for an NBA title — requires attention to even the smallest of details, something Casey has been hammering home all year.
It is part of the team’s desire to use the regular season as a series of steps to take to be ready for what they hope is an extended playoff run. And because the Raptors lead the conference and have been one of the best teams in the league since the turn of the calendar, they find themselves challenged every night. “I shouldn’t have to yell and scream to get guys to play hard,” Casey said. “It’s easy to get up (for) the Houston game (but) there’s 28 other teams out there that are trying to … come in your house and take your food, so that’s what we’ve got to get ready for.”