Nikola Vucevic Has Knee Bone Bruise – Today's Fastbreak
Orlando Magic big man Nikola Vucevic has a right knee bone bruise and will miss Friday night’s game against the Toronto Raptors, the Magic announced Thursday. It’s unclear when Vucevic will return to the court, as that’ll depend on how his knee responds to treatment. This actually isn’t bad news for Vucevic and the Magic, because the injury initially seemed worse than it turned out to be. The big man hurt the knee in the second half of Orlando’s 114-109 loss to the Houston Rockets on Wednesday night. Vucevic, 25, has gotten off to a solid start to the season, although his scoring and rebounding numbers are a bit down from last year. He averaged about 19 and 11 last year, and he’s at 15.8 points and 8.0 rebounds per game this year on 51.5 percent from the field. Vucevic is taking less shots thus far and his minutes are slightly down, but his 2.4 blocks per game are a nice surprise. He’s only blocked a shot a game once in his career.
Toronto Raptors: Grading Terrence Ross' Extension
Certainly if we use Jeremy Lamb and his three-year, $21 million contract as a measuring stick, it looks like the Raptors are getting more value based on both players’ performances coming into this season. Maybe not more value per dollar, which is probably not a formula we can solve, but let’s look at it in absolute terms. Ross eats more minutes, playing almost eight minutes more per game than Lamb over the course of their careers. He has also scored more per game, averaging 9.1 points to Lamb’s 7.1 points per game. Ross also averages a touch more in the rebounding department, with 2.6 against Lamb’s 2.1 per contest. What might make Ross the better option than Lamb is where they differ in three-point shooting. Lamb is shooting 35.3 percent from long range, while Ross is shooting 37.3 percent, and shot as well as 39.5 percent back in 2013-14, which was also his biggest season in terms of minutes played with 26 per game.
Game Day: Raptors @ Magic | Toronto Raptors
That scenario unfolded Wednesday night in Oklahoma City as the Raptors came out the gates cold and couldn’t buy a shot. The Thunder thrive in a fast-paced game where their superstars, Durant and Westbrook, can get out and run and attack the paint. What was different Wednesday, and with this team, is how they recognize the situation, slow the pace down and rely on their defence. “It was a grind-it-out-type game. That shows mental toughness, when you can win when everything’s not clicking,” was how Dwane Casey put it. The other bright spot was seeing a new tough side to this team led by big man Bismack Biyombo. Russell Westbrook appeared to take a cheap shot at Biyombo late in the game, prompting an immediate response from the Raptors forward. Biyombo explained the encounter post game. “They’re tough, but we’re tough too. We’re not backing off from nobody. One thing is, nobody is going to punk me.”
Are the Undefeated Toronto Raptors for Real? | numberfire
https://soundcloud.com/raptorsrepublic/blake-murphy-on-tsn1050-carroll-and-biyombo-setting-tone
According to our NBA power rankings, the Raptors are currently playing like the fifth-best team in the NBA and second in the Eastern Conference, trailing only the Golden State Warriors, Cleveland Cavaliers, Los Angeles Clippers, and San Antonio Spurs (pretty esteemed company). That ranking is based on their 66.2 nERD through five games. In case you're unfamiliar, Team nERD is one of our in-house metrics. It's set on a scale from 0-100, with 50 as the league average. This ranking is meant to be predictive of the team's ultimate winning percentage in a schedule-free vacuum based on performance-to-date. In other words, the Raptors are currently playing like a 54-win team (.662 winning percentage over 82 games). If you look at where the Dinos rank among the other 29 teams in some important categories so far, it's easy to see why our system is so in love with them They join both of last year's participants in the NBA Finals (the Warriors and Cavs) as one of only three teams currently in the top six in both Offensive and Defensive Efficiency, according to our numbers. Considering that they finished the 2014-15 season as the 23rd-ranked team in Defensive Efficiency, it certainly looks like the Raptors did a good job of addressing their issues this offseason when they brought in defensive-minded guys like DeMarre Carroll, Cory Joseph, and Bismack Biyombo.
NBA Preview – Toronto Raptors at Orlando Magic – Nov 06, 2015 | CBSSports.com
''I don't know how many games we're going to win, but I do know that we're going to scrap,'' Casey said. ''We're going to compete, play hard, get after people." The Raptors have done that in recent years against the Magic, allowing 91.0 points per game during their longest active winning streak versus an opponent. They won 16 straight over Chicago from 1999-2002 and 12 in a row over Minnesota from 2004-10.
Raptors' Bismack Biyombo won't back down | Toronto Sun
“I will tell you what, they are tough, but we are tough, too,” he said. “We don’t back off from nobody. We are going to come in and every building and play our game. We are going to be tough. That’s just our mindset. We don’t care who it is. We respect them. We respect their building. We respect their fans. But guess what, we are going to play here. We are going to go back to Toronto and we are going to handle our business.” Between them, Biyombo and DeMarre Carroll have added greatly to the toughness in this lineup, but they are far from the only guys willing to get down and dirty and battle an opponent. You won’t see Jonas Valanciunas or Luis Scola or Kyle Lowry or DeMar DeRozan backing down either. And we haven’t seen much of James Johnson yet, but we all know he’s not backing down.
Raptors-Orlando Magic: NBA game preview | Toronto Star
Need to know: The Raptors are off to their best start to a season but still have a ways to go to equal their biggest winning streak. They ran off nine straight in 2001-02 . . . Nikola Vucevic won’t play on Friday night. The team’s centre is out with a bone bruise on his right knee. Dewane Dedmon is expected to start in his place . . . Orlando is 1-4 but has fallen in a pair of very tight games this season. The Magic went to double OT with Oklahoma City on Oct. 30 and took the Rockets to overtime on Wednesday. They are losing their games by an average of 3.5 points . . . Mississauga’s Andrew Nicholson, now in his fourth year as a pro with the Magic, has seen action in one game this season.
Raptors staying grounded despite early success | Toronto Sun
Asked if he would quantify the victory over the Thunder as a character win, Casey barely moved the excitement needle. “It should be, but it’s early,” he said before lapsing into his most used phrase so far of 2015. “It’s a marathon, it’s not a sprint. We have to maintain this. I told the guys, get off their feet, no running around shopping or enjoying the sun in Orlando, we’re on a business trip. We’ve got to make sure we keep our minds on our business, get our rest, make rest our friend and continue.” You can’t blame Casey for taking this approach. When things went off the rails a year ago, it was because the Raptors got off to a fast start, got a little complacent in their attention to defence and, before you knew it, had convinced themselves they could just outscore every opponent that came along.
Raptors staying grounded despite early success | Toronto Sun
Asked if he would quantify the victory over the Thunder as a character win, Casey barely moved the excitement needle. “It should be, but it’s early,” he said before lapsing into his most used phrase so far of 2015. “It’s a marathon, it’s not a sprint. We have to maintain this. I told the guys, get off their feet, no running around shopping or enjoying the sun in Orlando, we’re on a business trip. We’ve got to make sure we keep our minds on our business, get our rest, make rest our friend and continue.” You can’t blame Casey for taking this approach. When things went off the rails a year ago, it was because the Raptors got off to a fast start, got a little complacent in their attention to defence and, before you knew it, had convinced themselves they could just outscore every opponent that came along.
Why The Toronto Raptors Are Off To Such A Hot Start | The Sports Quotient
The statistics further reflect the Raptors’ overall comfort when it comes to playing together as a team, as they are averaging 106.8 points per game. Their impressive offensive productivity has led to them to a ranking as the fifth-best offense in the NBA thus far. In addition, to back up Lowry’s claim that the Raptors players know where to be on the floor offensively, the team also does a great job of getting open for three-pointers. This explains why the team shoots a terrific 39.5% from three, which is the fourth-highest percentage in the league. In addition to getting open and scoring, the Raptors have also excelled at rebounding. The Raptors have a rebounding differential of 8.5, meaning they average 8.5 more rebounds than their opponents. Also, the team averages 49 rebounds per game, which places them at sixth in the league in that category. Valanciunas, who is averaging just over 10 rebounds per game, placed a big emphasis on dominating the boards when asked about his role. “That’s our job,” Valanciunas said. “Defense doesn’t end with a shot. You’ve got to end it with a rebound. To do your full job you’ve got to get a rebound and that’s what we do.”
The Raptors can really defend. What a shift. It is absurdly early, but the Raptors are allowing just 95.0 points per 100 possessions, seventh in the league. Opponents are shooting just 40.4 per cent against the Raptors (third in the league). Those numbers are bound to rise. However, the Raptors have gotten better on that end. Cory Joseph and DeMarre Carroll make the Raptors’ tangibly better on the perimeter, the biggest flaw of last year’s team. Bismack Biyombo is a legitimate rim protector, the type of player the Raptors have not had in years. If they can stay healthy, the Raptors should be a solid defensive team. Last year, they were 23rd in points allowed per possession. “I’ll tell you what, they’re tough, but we’re tough, too,” Biyombo said after the win over the Thunder. “We’re not backing off of nobody. We’re not going to back off. We’re going to come in every building and we’re going to play our game. We’re going to be tough, we’re not going to back off anybody. That’s just our mindset and we don’t care who it is.” Embrace the change.
Undefeated Raptors winning with toughness | TSN
"I mean, there is not much you can say about it," Biyombo told the media in Oklahoma City. "You let the image speak for itself, but one thing is nobody is going to punk me. Where I came from, you're not going to do that to me. I know there's a lot of TVs and of course everybody wants to look tough. It's good to look tough on TV and I respect that about everybody, but you're just not going to punk me. "I respect the game. I play the game with so much respect. I don't play to hurt nobody. If I set a screen, I set a right screen and if they call an offensive foul, then they call a foul and I respect that." Toughness is not a learned skill, you either have it or you don't. From the 23-year-old Biyombo to Luis Scola, 12 years his senior, to Joseph to do-it-all forward DeMarre Carroll, the Raptors have added pieces that are hardening them. Suddenly this is a very different looking team.
Cory Joseph in Raptors jersey a 'dream come true' | Sportsnet.ca
Joseph is a Toronto native, but he brings back lessons learned in the crucible of the game, with Gregg Popovich at San Antonio Spurs U. Fresh off the Raptors’ playoff flameout last spring, Ujiri made signing Joseph a priority as he tried to remake the character of a team he judged lacking in grit and too willing to fall into selfish play. “The education he got in San Antonio—you’re playing for one of the greatest coaches ever, you’re playing with three future Hall of Famers,” says Ujiri. “And the way he kept that poise, that composure, and [managed to] be ready whenever they needed him, it was telling.”
