RAPS’ REVIVAL NO SHOT IN THE DARK
Team’s blueprint for offensive success paying huge dividends on score sheet
Dwane Casey’s default setting in his conversations with the media after a thorough win like Wednesday’s 129-111 thrashing of the Hornets in Charlotte is a hope to “bottle” what the Raptors did right and use it at a later date.
In fact, Wednesday was basically the blueprint for the kind of success Casey and president Masai Ujiri and their respective staffs had in mind during the offseason when the popular buzz words were culture change and nothing was untouchable.
Ujiri and Co. wanted more ball movement and ball sharing. Wednesday in Charlotte, the Raptors had a season-best 35 assists.
There was also the call for more emphasis on the threepoint shot. Wednesday in Charlotte, the team tied a season-high with 16 threes on 33 attempts.
Underlying all of this was the desire to not be so reliant on just two players — Kyle Lowry and DeMar DeRozan — and while both figured in Wednesday’s win, as they do every game, they were just a part of it.
Anyone choosing to load up on either player in Charlotte paid the price. Almost everyone was in on this win from the 10th man off the bench in Delon Wright on up. It says something about how good those in charge believe this team can be that Casey spent a good portion of his post-game address lamenting the lack of defensive focus in garbage time in a game the Raptors had well in hand by a 20-point margin.
“No question,” Casey said when this new higher standard was pointed out. “I thought we had a good defensive game going up to that point and we came in with a lackadaisical ‘you shoot, I’ll shoot’ attitude and we’re not going to tolerate that from young guys coming into the league.”
But as ticked off as he was by his youngsters mailing it in over the final few minutes, not even an angry Casey could object to the suggestion that this was exactly the kind of game the franchise envisioned for itself way back in the summer when they first started floating the philosophical changes that were to come.
“It’s one game and, again, we’re fighting for consistency and we’ll take the 35 assists and continue to be consistent with it,” Casey said somewhat grudgingly.
There was just so much to like about this particular game.
You saw further evidence that OG Anunoby, the soft-spoken but fearless rookie, is going to be that three-and-D guy Ujiri has been trying to locate since he arrived. Injuries kept former Raptor DeMarre Carroll from filling that role, but Anunoby in just the 29th game of his NBA career and 17th start is already looking like he’ll fill the role Carroll could not.
His 20-point night, which included a 6-for-7 performance from behind the arc, was a career high, but he’s much more than just an offensive threat from the corner.
Anyone who witnessed Anunoby get two hands on the same basketball Dwight Howard did and then basically rag-doll the Hornets centre who has three inches, 33 pounds and 13 years of experience on the younger Anunoby couldn’t help but walk away impressed.
Anunoby outmuscled and outwrestled Howard so badly he left him in a heap on the baseline. Not that the young man needs any more confidence in his game, but if he was at all hesitant about his place in the league before that particular play, he dispelled those doubts in a big way.
Serge Ibaka is no rookie, but he was certainly playing like one Wednesday after resting during Sunday’s game against Sacramento. Ibaka, for the better part of a few weeks now, is finally looking comfortable both in the system he is playing and the people surrounding him.
Ibaka, and this goes for Anunoby as well, is getting wideopen looks with teams focusing on DeRozan and Lowry and both he and the rookie are making opponents pay.
Ibaka looks like a different player these past few weeks and if he can maintain that, even if it means the odd game here or there where he doesn’t play, it gives the Raptors three excellent scoring options rather than just the two they’ve been trying to get by with for the past four seasons or so.
And then there’s centre Jonas Valanciunas. The Lithuanian big man didn’t get in on the offensive hysterics Wednesday, but he was pivotal in negating the only real offensive option the Hornets have had with any consistency of late.
Howard has been integral to much of the Hornets’ success in forcing teams to pack in their defence to keep him at bay, which opens the floor up for the likes of Kemba Walker, Frank Kaminsky and Nicolas Batum.
All Valanciunas did was lock the big man up, holding him to just a pair of free throws while he was on him in the game and frustrating him to no end.
Howard isn’t accustomed to being manhandled, but with Valanciunas as the primary defender with help from Ibaka and even Anunoby when need be, he was bottled up and made insignificant by the Toronto defenders, Valanciunas in particular.
It was only one game, but it was the type of game that had more than a few people wondering if they have underestimated this group and how far they can go.