A big part of me would have been equally happy with last night’s win whether it was over Philadelphia or Cleveland. That the Raps beat Lebron James and the reigning Eastern Conference champions is fantastic, don’t get it twisted, but the fact that they did so by executing smart, cohesive team offense down the stretch is far more satisfying to me. Gone were the limp-ins to long DeMar isolations off of slow-starting perimeter dribble hand-offs. Instead we saw drive and kick penetration that broke down the defense before presenting a good shot, pick and roll that actually utilized the roll man and the ball working it’s way around to the third or fourth pass to the open shooter in the corner. It’s a sign that the Raptors are capable of beating a very good team when they play intelligent team basketball.
Kyle Lowry was the best player on the court last night. Skinny Kyle Lowry has been a whole new revelation this year, looking like an offensively polished version of the blur that burned the league with speed back in his earlier Houston Rockets days. He showed why he’s leading the league in steals per game right now, adding 4 steals last night and turning several of those into fast break points. Lowry has become a weapon in transition this season, and he burned the Cavaliers last night for a pull-up 3 when he was left unguarded and broke down the defense immediately on his way to the hoop whenever they left the door open. Tenacious defensive Kyle Lowry is back too, and that dude is a lot of fun. He scored a bucket in the 4th at one point, and then immediately made it clear on defense that there was no way he was going to allow Jared Cunningham to get to play. He was simply all over him, as if offended that the Cavs would actually allow Cunningham to try and handle the ball against him. He made about four attempts to steal the ball without fouling or giving up position before eventually poking it loose and rushing the team up for a transition score. Lowry’s execution working the high pick and roll with Biyombo sealed the game for the Raptors in the final minutes as Cleveland was able to score, but unable to stop Lowry and Biyombo from doing the same to chip into the Raptor’s lead.
Bismack Biyombo made huge offensive contributions late? No, seriously, he totally did! Despite recent speculation that Biyombo may have undergone elective surgery to have his hands replaced with his feet and vice-versa, Biyombo scored 6 of his 11 points in the decisive moments of the 4th quarter. He got to the line 7 times over the course of the game, mostly via his tenacious effort on the offensive glass. He screened effectively for Lowry, opening up driving lanes, and hammered home a dunk to help seal the win when the Cavaliers decided to abandon guarding him whatsoever in selling out to all out double the ball handler instead. This is a strategy opposing teams have used successfully at times this year, knowing how reluctant Raptors ball handlers can often be in the pick and roll to utilize the rolling big man. Lowry made great passes to Biyombo who simply had to slam the ball home, a shot he proved particularly more efficient in than woeful lay-up attempts so far this year. Biyombo also did a great job of affecting shots. It makes a world of difference to have a legitimate rim protector to force Lebron to kick out passes instead of lay-in his drives. Lebron created a wealth of open perimeter looks for his teammates still, but you’re more confident making Jared Cunningham or Mo Williams shoot from outside than you are with Lebron at the rim. Biyombo helped force the former of the two and was a lone defensive rebounding force in a game that really lacked considerable minutes from another true center on either team. Mozgov and Valanciunas both missed this game and both teams spent a lot of time essentially playing small or two power forward lineups.
I’d be remiss not to mention Luis Scola, the savvy veteran who continues to seem to have the ability to buoy the team offensively when they need him to. Scola was 7 for 9 in the first quarter alone, scoring all 15 of his points in the opening frame. Scola’s ability to post-up, find open shots for himself, cut to the basket and even spot-up from 3 stretch the floor has made him a far more valuable offensive option at the starting 4 spot than most of us predicted he would be.
The game was won by Toronto much more than it was lost by Cleveland, but Cleveland also did not look like a championship level squad last night either. Cleveland is going to be a bad defense a lot of the time when they’re relying on Williams, J.R. Smith and Kevin Love. That showed late last night, badly. The Cavaliers were either too tired or too lazy to make their rotations and it got Biyombo, DeRozan and Lowry easy baskets. I’m not taking anything away from the Raptors, they executed, but the Cavaliers either simply didn’t have it in the gas tank, or kind of just gave up late too. The result was passive aggressive Lebron James, who has sometimes seemed content to check out offensively late in games when his team is playing lazy or stupid as an attempt to try and prove a point to his teammates. As if to say, “fine, you’re not going to try, then I’m not going to carry you on my back and we’ll see what happens. Oh, you can’t do it without me? Maybe you need to listen to me and give a crap then!” The Cavaliers held a players-only meeting after the game where maybe some of that frustration was addressed directly. Regardless, the Raptors looked like a team last night that had it’s ish together and was heading in the right direction. Much more so than the Cleveland Cavaliers, and if you had of suggested that to me at any point during the latter half of the West Coast road trip the Raps just finished I would have scoffed at you, so that’s great to see. Yay, go Dinos!
