TORONTO WORKS OVERTIME TO THWART THE CHAMPS
RAPTORS 131, WARRIORS 128 (OT)
Nothing comes easy when you are trying to knock off the champs.
Even with mainstays Steph Curry and Draymond Green out of the lineup, the Golden State Warriors took this one right to the wire, but it was the Toronto Raptors who finally prevailed.
It required overtime, but it will go into the books as the Raptors’ first win in nine outings against the Warriors.
The 131-128 victory at Toronto’s Scotiabank Arena didn’t come easy.
All it took was an early 18-point Raptors lead that got frittered away down to two before it got back up to double digits and then again got erased.
Kevin Durant, who was essentially a one-man band for the Warriors, would come down with 8.6 seconds left and the Warriors trailing by three, to hit a turnaround three to tie the game. It didn’t even appear he had time to look at the basket with the Raptors’ Kawhi Leonard all over him. Durant let it fly like there was no one there.
The Raptors had a chance to win it with the last shot and the ball in Leonard’s hands. He moved deep into the paint and then tossed it back outside to Serge Ibaka a second too late as regulation time expired before Ibaka could get a shot off.
In the overtime it was everyone but Leonard and Kyle Lowry, the two go-to Raptors, who would eventually knock out the Warriors once and for all.
Pascal Siakam, who would finish with 26 points, would get inside and open the scoring in the overtime. Ibaka would follow with a mid-range jumper of his own to go up four.
The Warriors would get it all back as Durant, who was on his way to 51, would get one from the line and then hit a three to tie it again.
Danny Green, who always seems to be clutch, hit a three to put the Raptors back up with 1:20 to go.
The Warriors would come back to erase that lead, as well, until a steal by Lowry sent Siakam to the line for two, both of which he converted. He would get to the line four more times over the final minute and hit three more to seal the win.
The 26 points by Siakam were a career high. Leonard finished with a team-high 37 in his best game with the Raptors, while Lowry had another double-double with 10 points and 12 assists.
With the win, the Raptors improved to 19-4, while the Warriors fell to 15-8.
The two teams will renew acquaintances in a couple of weeks in Oakland, only next time, barring any further injuries, the Warriors should be at full strength.
BENCH NEEDS TO START FRESH
Forget last year. That in a nutshell is what the Toronto Raptors’ bench is preaching to each other these days.
All the talk about the bench mob and how strong they were a year ago is a huge waste of breath and brain cells. That’s the past. This year’s bench is different in makeup and experience and life situations, and all sorts of other ways. It can’t be the same.
Some 22 games into the season, that may be the biggest lesson Toronto’s non-starters have learned.
“We’re going to have to be better as a unit,” Fred VanVleet said. “It’s different. We have to let last year be last year and figure some new things out this year. Just come with a better defensive approach.”
VanVleet said defence, more than anything else, is the key to unlocking the bench and getting them back to being a productive unit, night in and night out.
“It feels like it,” VanVleet said. “Obviously, the last two or three games, we’ve been trading baskets.”
And trading baskets might be fine on another team, but in Toronto, the bar for the bench is higher. They not only maintain leads, they also build on them.
VanVleet sounds very confident that this year’s bench will get there, but he warns it’s not going to be an overnight thing.
“It’s going to take some time,” he said, “but we will figure it out.”
Head coach Nick Nurse says he actually gets short with this coaching staff when they start talking about what the bench did a year ago. He hasn’t got time for that. He also has no time for his second unit’s inconsistency when it comes to an all-around defensive effort.
“They aren’t creating enough out of their defence and they know it,” he said. “They’ve got to buckle down here, and with them, more than anything we’ll get three of four guys playing and one guy breaking down or three guys playing and two guys not. The defence has to be a five-man together thing if it’s going to be good.”
To date, with a couple of exceptions including Tuesday’s win in Memphis, it’s been the starters carrying the load and the bench merely holding serve until they’re back on the floor.
If the Raptors are to be a team that contends for a championship this year, they’re going to need more from that second unit.
Now that the injuries are behind them and there’s some consistency in the guys they’re on the floor with, maybe that can begin.
QUICK HITS
Greg Monroe was active Thursday night after missing the previous game in Memphis with back spasms ... Overshadowed by the absences of both Curry and Green from the Warriors lineup was the additional absence of former Raptor Alfonzo McKinnie. McKinnie, who is out with a sore left foot, has appeared in 16 games for the Warriors and is averaging 6.3 points a night and 3.8 rebounds in just under 16 minutes per game.