RaptoRs notebook

There is a lot to sort out about the Toronto Raptors’ second unit. But Tyler Hansbrough, who played with the Indiana Pacers for the first four years of his career, seems to be pencilled in to be the first big man off of the bench, behind Jonas Valanciunas and Amir Johnson. “I was telling everybody yesterday, Tyler is my favourite player on the team,” reserve swingman Terrence Ross said. “He gets the ball every time, lots of offensive rebounds, and it’s either a bucket or a foul. You have to love that on your team. I love playing with him.” Hansbrough had 17 points and nine rebounds on Monday night in his Raptors debut, a 97-89 win over the Celtics in Boston. “If you don’t compete against him in practice, you’re going to get embarrassed. He raises the level of intensity in practice by just keeping coming at you,” Raptors coach Dwane Casey said. “Sometimes, it’s too hard. Life is too hard and guys don’t want to fight that relentless coming at you, and they give in. We need to get a lot more guys playing [like Hansbrough does] to make it hard. He plays at a playoff level every possession.” And now, for the bad from the pre-season opener. The Raptors turned the ball over 26 times, including at least three apiece from each member of the starting unit. “Twenty-six turnovers is way too many. Not a few — 26 is a lot more than a few,” Casey said, partially attributing the sloppiness to the team’s focus on defence during training camp. Kyle Lowry bumped his hand in practice, and his status for Wednesday’s pre-season game against Minnesota was not immediately known.