Third-quarter blues haunting Raptors
Eventually the Raptors will solve this abnormality. It really makes no sense. How do you explain the same players, competing largely against the same opponents, able to dominate at one point in games, and completely getting their lunch handed to them at others?
The Raptors have been talking about this same third-quarter falloff periodically over the past few years but it reached a boiling point Wednesday night. For the third time in four games, the third quarter blues took a chunk out of a huge lead.
Because it has occurred so frequently, Dwane Casey felt the need to bring as much attention to it as he did with a short, no- nonsense condemnation of the seeming unexplainable penchant for coughing up large leads via lacklustre third quarters. And right now it’s all hands on deck to get this thing figured out before it costs the Raptors more than the two ( almost three) games it did in the past week.
In New York, the Raps were up 11 at the half. By the time the carnage of the third had cleared, the deficit was 20 versus the Knicks.
Two nights later in Indianapolis, again following a strong second quarter led by the bench mob, the Raptors were up 11 over the Pacers. But another leaky third put them down one going into the fourth.
The Raps would lose both of those games and appeared headed that way again Wednesday against the Bobcats when a 19- point halftime lead was cut to eight in the third. This time, however, the Raptors hung on.
Casey doesn’t want his team just hanging on. He wants them to take care of business in the third and kill whatever hopes opponents have of making a comeback.
“I try to keep reminding guys those first five minutes are huge,” said C. J. Miles, a veteran of 12 NBA seasons and a guy normally watching the third quarter collapses from the bench.
“Especially when you have a lead because you can pretty much almost end a game in those first five minutes if you have a big lead. You can change the other teams’ attitude as far as what they believe they can do.
“That first few minutes we end up having to call the first time out and then the bench gets into it and you can see guys start feeling themselves and you give them a confidence they really didn’t have coming out of the half.”
And these aren’t exactly NBA juggernauts the Raptors have been letting back into games. The Knicks, Pacers and Bobcats have a combined record of 31-32.
“I think we got to come out and understand the score is 0- 0 and just kind of stomp on people,” Miles said. “There have been a lot of games where those starters should not have had to play again after that first eight minutes of the third.”
Fred VanVleet, who directs that second unit, sees what’s happening and knows it can’t continue if the Raptors are to remain competitive.
“When you start off bad, it just kind of snowballs and you get that feeling,” VanVleet said. “I think ( Wednesday night) they scored the first four or five possessions … they scored a lot in a row and then your offence gets tight, you start to tighten up and you’re not playing loose anymore so we’ve just got to get back to the fundamentals, locking in, guarding, getting stops so that way if you’re struggling offensively at least it’s a 6- 0 run and not a 19- 0 run.”