Big fundamentals haunting Raptors
DENVER— It’s unfair to discuss the lapses in the Toronto Raptors defence solely on the circumstances of their last two games since the offensive firepower of the Cleveland Cavaliers and Golden State Warriors often lays waste to the best the NBA has to offer.
But even taking those two losses for what they were, there are disturbing trends developing that have coach Dwane Casey and the players searching for the defensive “identity” they so crave.
“The thing that is (primarily) concerning is the trend — not just in the past two games but in the past four games — with our defensive fundamentals,” Casey said here Friday before the Raptors faced the Denver Nuggets. “Our tags (staying in touch with cutters in the lane to disrupt them), our tight paint, our controlling the ball in pick-and-roll situations. But then those two teams — Cleveland and Golden State — will expose every mistake you make, all of the fundamentals.”
The Raptors are in the midst of a defensive slump that has taken away from one of the NBA’s most prolific and explosive offences.
They began Friday night play ranked 26th of 30 teams in defensive rebounding, 21st in second-chance points yielded and 18th in points in the paint given up. Protecting the area closest to the basket, boxing out and not conceding extra possessions are at the heart of Casey’s defensive principles. To mess them up creates all sorts of breakdowns with no one group of players to blame more than another.
“I think it’s a full team effort, everyone’s effort, to make sure we’re communicating and make sure we’re doing the things we’re supposed to do and following the game plan,” Kyle Lowry said.
“Sometimes we play some teams that are very offensive minded, Cleveland and the Warriors, and they’re going to score with the way they space the floor, but we still have to talk and communicate and stick to our principles.”
For Casey, the entire defence is predicated on keeping the ball-handler under control. Whether that’s big men impacting screen-and-roll plays, weakside de- fenders creeping near the basket to protect the paint or finding someone to box out as soon as a shot goes up, if the ball is loose so is the defence.
“You lose the ball and now all at once the big has to come and help, and then now you are stretched out and the crackdown guy (a secondary defender) doesn’t get in a position to box out and there’s a secondchance point right there,” Casey said. “So (not getting) 50/50 balls, second-chance points, all of them are a byproduct of getting the ball under control and making sure you have a tight paint. “Everything is tied together.” It’s hard to discern what specific statistic best represents good defence — Casey leans towards an opponent’s field-goal percentage but sometimes teams just make shots, while Lowry looks at contested shots and field-goal percentage — but many times it’s just the eye test: If it looks bad, it is.
“We’ve been getting beat a lot in transition, getting caught scrambling,” DeMar DeRozan said. “Teams catching a rhythm and next thing you look up and we gave up 30 points in a quarter. It can’t be that. We can’t let that happen.
“We have to have a goal of 23 points or under for a quarter and figure it out from there.”