HOLD YOUR BREATH TIME DESPITE RAPTORS WIN
Starters Gasol, Powell leave game against Pistons with injuries
When is a win a loss? When two of your starters get injured.
That’s what happened to the Toronto Raptors when centre Marc Gasol and shooting guard Norman Powell both had to leave the game against the Pistons for good after separate incidents.
Gasol was lost in the first quarter of the eventual 112-99 victory due to a hamstring injury and Powell hurt his shoulder late in the fourth in what was still a close game. Earlier, Gasol had pulled up lame while running back on defence and immediately called to come out of the game before heading to the back for further testing.
Gasol’s absence meant a busy night for both Serge Ibaka and for Chris Boucher.
Powell hurt his left shoulder when Blake Griffin crushed him on a screen. He stayed down while the play continued and was helped off looking to be in agony. It was the same shoulder that kept Powell out of action for a quarter of the season last year.
In the end, Toronto was left wondering how short- handed the team would be for Friday’s game against Washington.
The Raptors got huge efforts from Pascal Siakam (26 points), OG Anunoby ( 19) and Ibaka ( 25 points and 13 rebounds) and, got a triple- double from Kyle Lowry (20, 10 and 10).
The Raptors also took advantage of wretched outside shooting by Detroit. The Pistons shot just 6- for- 35 ( 17.1 per cent) on three- pointers. That was particularly odd, since Detroit entered the game ranked second in the NBA in three-point accuracy (38.5 per cent).
An awful third quarter is what really did Detroit in. The Pistons shot just 30 per cent from the field in the frame and big men Griffin and Andre Drummond looked rusty.
Griffin was just back from missing a game due to knee pain and had issues with turnovers, as did centre Drummond, who had missed two straight due to an eye issue. They combined for seven turnovers and struggled defensively for much of the night.
There’s always a huge contingent of Raptors fans for games against the Pistons, but even more show up now that the games are in downtown Detroit instead of the Auburn Hills suburb an hour or so away.
The “Let’s Go Raptors” chants started almost immediately, when the video introducing the Pistons was played. The chants continued all evening and the Detroit gameops staff consistently responded by turning the music way up to try to drown them out.
At a few points fans even began playfully going at each other with duelling chants: “Raptors suck” from the Pistons faithful, and “Let’s Go Raptors” or “We the North” from the visitors.
Sometimes it was nearly as entertaining as what was happening on the court.
SPICY BLOCK PARTY
Siakam swatted away a pair of Griffin jump shots during Wednesday’s game, along with another attempt. While his offence gets the bulk of the attention, Siakam’s also one of the NBA’S best defenders. These block parties are starting to become the norm for the power forward.
This was the third time in the last four games that Siakam blocked three shots in a game after only doing that one other time this season.
When Siakam swatted away a Drummond attempt in the third quarter he tied his career- high with four blocks. He hadn’t done it since 2017.
NO SHOOTAROUND, NO PROBLEM
The Raptors have mostly eliminated morning shootarounds for home games, but usually hold them while on the road ( if it isn’t the conclusion of a back- toback). However, the team stayed pretty far from downtown Detroit and decided not to hold a shootaround.
The players didn’t seem to mind. Rookie Terence Davis said “nah, not necessarily,” when asked if not shooting around in the morning messes with his routine.
Both Lowry and Siakam picked up technical fouls in the first half and Nurse nearly got one of his own when the referees somehow let an egregious Drummond foul on Terence Davis go. Toronto also won a coaching challenge and had a Pistons foul overturned. At one point a technical foul call on Drummond wiped out a Lowry three, leading to confusion since the points had stood a few games ago when a similar thing happened. The technical had been called after the basket went on the board in that one. Later Griffin got called for a technical foul too. The referees were busy ... Toronto has won eight of its last 11 meetings with Detroit, though the Pistons swept last year’s season series.