Barnes answers the bell
Rookie rewards Raptors’ high expectations for him with 27-point night
There is so much to like about the first half of Scottie Barnes’ rookie NBA season. And so much more he can give.
The passing belies his youth, the shooting is better than many experts had expected, the defence is as advertised, And when it comes time to tally the rookie of the year ballots in a few months, the Raptors forward will figure significantly in the counting.
Yet there is more the Raptors could get, more they want, more they need from a 20-year-old gaining invaluable experience on a team in the thick of an Eastern Conference playoff race. Most of it is mental, as it is so often with first-year players.
“He’s a rookie and he has a rookie season and there’s nights when he’s super engaged and aggressive and there’s nights when he’s not,” Raptors coach Nick Nurse said this week of Barnes, who had a seasonbest 27 points Friday as Toronto finished a five-game road trip with a 109-105 win in Washington against the Wizards.
“It’s kind of a thing for first-year players to have kind of big swings and Scottie does it within games. Sometimes he’ll have nothing at the half and end up with 16 points or something.”
Barnes, who found himself on the bench before the game was two minutes old, righted himself and quickly and emphatically turning into the kind of aggressive scorer the Raptors have wanted him to be all season, punishing the Wizards in the paint and finishing 12-for-19 from the field.
“He was aggressive, he was physical tonight, he was assertive from the jump,” guard Fred VanVleet said. “He had a couple of miscues early, I think Coach took him out and got him right back in.
“He was pretty locked in and obviously he’s got a high, high ceiling … and any time he’s got it going like that, (you) just try to get him the ball in his spots.”
Barnes should benefit more from playing with proven scorers like VanVleet and Siakam and could make teams pay for not devoting more defensive attention to him. That’s when he has to be more aggressive.
“I think the opportunities … present themselves to him, probably, because of all the attention they are paying to Pascal and Freddy, in particular, and OG (Anunoby) next, probably,” Nurse said. “And then, if he gets a few more opportunities, then I would assume those kind of coverages would be the same going forward while we’re missing a couple starters.”
The Raptors got starter Gary Trent Jr. back after he missed six games with ankle swelling and it allowed Nurse to extend the rotation to more than the seven players he had been relying on the previous 10 days.
Trent started, Yuta Watanabe got on the floor for the first time in three games and Precious Achiuwa, Chris Boucher and Justin Champagnie also came off the bench as the Raptors used nine players.
But because the primary job of any coach is to find the combinations that give his team its best chance to win each night. VanVleet, Siakam, Barnes and Anunoby still logged extensive minutes.
VanVleet finished with 21 points and 12 assists in 39 minutes, Siakam had 21 points in 41 minutes, Anunoby had 12 points in 42 minutes and Trent played nearly 30 minutes.
The Raptors went nearly five minutes at the end of the fourth quarter without a basket before a VanVleet three-pointer with about a minute left broke a 102-102 tie and Anunoby got a put-back basket on the ensuing Toronto possession to seal the game.
The Raptors are more than pleased with the total package that Barnes brings but, because they see the possibility of true greatness in his future, they want more. They want the six-foot-nine forward to take command more often, to not be a passive observer at all, to give more of the good they get from him.
“I just think that Scottie’s a good player who can score, I think he needs to just make sure he stays in that mindset of being aggressive,” Nurse said.