Raptors rebound with home fire
Amir Johnson, Kleiza fuel much-needed win with assist from Casey
Dwane Casey makes his coaching bones on the strength of his defensive knowledge and ability to teach, but he might have won a game for the Raptors on Friday with a couple of key moves to generate some offence.
With his team stagnant — little ball movement, less people movement — and a significant lead slipping away, Casey made a subtle change to his substitution pattern that kick-started the Raptors to an eventual 106-89 rout of the woeful Washington Wizards at the Air Canada Centre.
A12-point lead had been cut to five three minutes into the second half and the Raptors were reeling. Knowing he had to do something to inject some energy into the offence, Casey called on Linas Kleiza for the first time in the game.
Klieza made a nifty cut through the lane for a basket on his first possession and drilled an open three-pointer seconds later. The Wizards’ run was quelled and the Raptors were able to run away with their easiest victory of the season.
“That was to get our offence going a little bit,” Casey said. “James (Johnson) had missed a couple of easy jump shots and I thought we just needed to spread the floor. They started packing it in a bit more and we got stagnant. L.K. (Kleiza) came in and did a good job of stretching the floor, similar to what he did for us in Utah.
“Also, too, the small lineup was hurting us a little bit with Demar (Derozan) trying to guard (Rashard) Lewis in the post. We had to go with something different.”
It worked to perfection as the Raptors went on to build an 11-point lead after three quarters and coast home in a game won by the off-the-bench exploits of Kleiza (15 points), Leandro Barbosa (19 points) and a resurgent Amir Johnson, who had his best game in weeks with 18 points and 13 rebounds.
Johnson, who had been dealing with some family issues that had an impact on his play, grabbed seven offensive rebounds as Toronto came up with 28 second-chance points, the most by a Raptors team since 2005.
“I definitely haven’t been consis- tent. This game was a little bit of a breakthrough game for me and I was glad I was able to pick my energy up,” said Johnson. Casey was far more emphatic that Johnson about the young big man’s play against a Washington team that’s generally solid inside with JaVale Mcgee and Jan Vesely. “Amir was a monster,” said the coach. “I thought he did a great job of rolling to the basket, cleaning up the offensive boards. . . . Amir was very, very active. . . . He did a good job of bouncing back.” Casey had a meeting with Johnson on Thursday to discuss the un- specified off-court issues that had been bothering the player. It was not some hugely impassioned chat that led to the turnaround, though. “I wish I could say that,” said the coach. “He has some family issues going on and hopefully things are going to go well. He came out and fought through it tonight, and I’m really proud of him and happy for him.” The Raptors simply dominated the Wizards in every facet of the game, save those three or four offensively stagnant minutes at the start of the second half. Jose Calderon had 17 assists, four more than the entire Washington team.
The Raptors had an astonishing 61-37 advantage on the boards and held the Wizards to 38 per cent shooting.
“The overall focus was good. They came out like a team that was embarrassed by what had happened against Atlanta and Boston,” said Casey.
It was just Toronto’s third win in nine games at the Air Canada Centre, and their most impressive home outing.
“(It’s) very important,” said Johnson. “It’s not just for the team, it’s for the fans. We owe them more.”