Raptors breathe easier after defence improves
That slight breeze emanating from Houston Wednesday night was the collective exhale of a Toronto Raptors’ team that is finally starting to play like it was expected to play.
Reintroduced to its game over the last week — but only really making itself apparent in Wednesday’s 115-102 win over Houston — was a defensive approach that’s primarily been responsible for the team success over the past few seasons.
“Basically we had a deep discussion pre-game and we talked about getting back to playing the type of basketball we needed to play and the principles we needed to play with,” Raptors defensive stopper DeMarre Carroll said post game.
“I think that cleared a lot of people’s minds, especially myself. I understood where I needed to be and where the help was going to come. That was key. But at the same time I think we took it upon ourselves that we weren’t going to let another team just come in and run over us.”
Carroll was locked in on both ends of the court, making life difficult for James Harden on the defensive end with four steals and three blocks, while spacing the floor for the Kyle Lowry/ DeMar DeRozan duo on the other side, knocking down the shots when the Rockets cheated off him to put more attention on the other two.
“They are going to help on Kyle and (DeMar),” Carroll said. “I have to be the guy who spaces the floor, especially in that first unit. Terrence (Ross) does a good job of that and Cory (Joseph) helps him. We just have to do it as a team. We have to be able to space the floor and I have to knock down my threes. I took it upon myself to work on it, by no means am I there yet, but just keep working and live with the results.”
Harden, the league’s fourthleading scorer, was held to just seven points in the first half before a frantic 12 in the final quarter got him up to a more Harden-like 29 for the game. He noticed the difference in Toronto’s attention to defence.
“They did a really good job, a really good job of packing the paint, getting to our shooters and just playing really good defence,” Harden said. “On the other hand they made shots, they made three pointers. So tough game; they played really well and we didn’t play well at all.”
Harden admitted he took this one “on the chin” for his 12 turnovers of a season team-high 28 in the game.
But you have to credit the Raptors for some of those turnovers, as well. Both Carroll and Patrick Patterson had four steals apiece while DeRozan had two. Joseph also had one of those get-better nights after a talk with head coach Dwane Casey Monday in Los Angeles.
“We talked about it before last game,” Joseph said after the win. “He didn’t want me to defer as much. Just be aggressive and don’t think. The first however many games maybe I was thinking a little too much. I felt like the shots I took were good shots. They just didn’t go in. (Against Houston), they went in.”
As with Carroll, Casey liked what he saw from Joseph on both ends of the floor.
“The most important thing Cory’s got to do is give us a presence defensively,” Casey said. “That’s on his role card, he’s a defensive player first, leading our second unit defensively and then whatever the game gives him offensively, take it.”
Casey is convinced Joseph was guilty earlier in the season of worrying too much about helping DeRozan score at a high volume instead of focusing on his own offence.
“Cory’s just got to play,” Casey said. “He’s just got to play basketball. He doesn’t have to worry about getting DeMar the ball, play basketball. Take what the game gives him, if it gives him a drive to the basket, take it; if it gives him a jump shot, take it.”
Joseph has always been a defence-first guy and the questions about his defence seemed to bother him far more than any talk about his offence.
“I have been a little more active the last couple of games,” he said of his individual defence. “But my on the ball defence I have been happy with. Just rotations, I think we are all working on that as a team.”
There is more emphasis than ever on rotating to the next cover this season without the shotblocking, rim-protecting presence of Bismack Biyombo waiting back there to clean things up.
“One hundred per cent,” Joseph said, “because Bismack used to challenge everything at the rim so it was a little easier on the rotations. Now you got to be there a little earlier because you know you don’t have Biz to protect the rim like you had before. Lucas (Nogueira) and Jonas (Valanciunas) over the last couple of games they started to do a better job too.”
It was by no means a perfect game, but the defensive strides made in this one had everyone breathing a little easier.