DeRozan secure playing own game DEADLY MID-RANGE MENACE
TORONTO – DeMar DeRozan is no stranger to the Milwaukee Bucks.
The Toronto Raptors all-star hit a clutch shot with Bucks guard Tony Snell draped all over him the first time the teams met this season, clinching a 105-99 Raptors victory in Milwaukee during Thanksgiving weekend.
The Bucks will get to know him even better as they clash with the Raptors in a first-round Eastern Conference playoff series, beginning Saturday with Game 1 at the Air Canada Centre.
DeRozan is dubbed the king of the mid-range game, and it’s a title he’s proud to call his own.
Let the other guys bomb away with three-pointers. The 27year-old DeRozan, now in his seventh NBA season, would rather play to his strengths.
“I don’t pay attention to what anybody else does,” DeRozan said after the Raptors’ practice session at the BioSteel Centre on Friday. “I work on what I know I’m comfortable with, and until somebody stops me doing that and forces me to do something else, I’m going to stick to that.
“It’s nothing against the three-pointer. I choose to get to my spots. Sometimes I’d be upset if I shoot 3 threes when I
could have had an opportunity to shoot six free throws. That’s always been my mentality and it’s got me to where I’m at now.”
This season DeRozan became just the third shooting guard in the last 20 years to average 27 points while attempting fewer than 2 three-pointers a game. The others? Michael Jordan and Dwyane Wade.
The 6-foot-7 DeRozan is a perfect complement to point guard Kyle Lowry, who is not afraid to launch from anywhere on the court. The duo averaged 41.7 points and shot 52.1% from the field during three regularseason games together against the Bucks. Lowry was not available for the fourth meeting, a Bucks victory in March.
If the Bucks are counting on pulling an upset in their best-ofseven
series against the Raptors, they will have to defend Toronto’s backcourt duo.
It all starts at 4:30 p.m. Saturday, and Toronto is considered a solid threat to Cleveland in the East after reaching the conference finals and losing to the Cavaliers in six games last season.
But the third-seeded Raptors must get past the sixth-seeded Bucks before thinking about a matchup against the secondseeded Cavaliers.
“The first thing that stands out is their length,” DeRozan said of the Bucks. “Their length is incredible, especially Giannis (Antetokounmpo). You’ve got Thon Maker out there; you’ve got (Khris) Middleton.
“They’ll be in the right position. That’s why they are where they are now.”
DeRozan has a strong connection with Bucks assistant coach Eric Hughes, who spent six seasons in Toronto as an assistant.
“I credit a lot of the player I
am today to Eric Hughes,” DeRozan said. “From Day 1 after I was drafted, I was with him day in and day out.
“All summer, all season. Him and my other trainer, Chris Farr, molded me into the player I am now. They pushed me to another level. They saw something in me that I probably didn’t see then.”
DeRozan has improved this season and had to carry a big load while Lowry was sidelined for 21 games by a right wrist injury.
Raptors coach Dwane Casey has seen DeRozan's transformation over the last few years.
“He’s very comfortable in his own skin,” Casey said. “He’s harder now to speed up. When he was younger, you could double-team him and press up into him and it would bother him.
“Just all the USA basketball experience and multiple all-star games (have helped). That’s the difference right now.
“Now he’s a man, and we’ve
watched him grow up. Time, that’s something you can’t give anybody. You want to give it to players. But it just takes time in this game; it doesn’t come overnight.”
While the Raptors will be trying to figure out ways to stop Antetokounmpo, he knows the danger posed by the Raptors backcourt duo.
“Definitely, we have to rise to the occasion and match their intensity,” Antetokounmpo said. “Those guys, you have to show them bodies as much as you can and get them out of their sweet spots.
“And try to not let them go to the free-throw line and get easy calls. If we foul them, we’ve got to foul them hard so they have to earn every free throw, every shot they get.”
Bucks center Greg Monroe said it’s critical for the 6-8 Middleton to be back in the lineup. The Bucks lost the first three games to Toronto when he was out with an injury, with their
only victory in the series coming on March 4 after he had returned.
“He gives us another person who is similar in size to DeRozan,” Monroe said. “Those two are all-star guards.”
Bucks coach Jason Kidd had success against Toronto in the 2014 postseason when he was in his first year as an NBA coach. His Brooklyn Nets outlasted the Raptors in a thrilling sevengame, first-round series, but Paul Pierce and Joe Johnson were the experienced ones with the Nets. Lowry and DeRozan were getting an early taste of playoff basketball.
Now the Raptors tandem is older and wiser.
“We’ve got to make them go to their second and third moves and make it tough,” Kidd said. “They’re going to make tough shots; that’s why they’re allstars.
“We have to execute our game plan and make them work on the other (defensive) end.”