Erie Bayhawks 100, Raptors 905 83 | Box Score
One team in the organization was bound to lose eventually. With the parent club Toronto Raptors locking down their 11th victory in a row on Saturday, D-League affiliate Raptors 905 saw their own six-game streak snapped at the hands of the Erie Bayhawks.
The 905 had turned a nine-game losing skid into a series of #proveems, finding themselves in the same situations they had floundered in previously and this time overcoming them. Two of those wins came against Erie, and Erie’s victory Saturday is a bit of an about-face – the 905 had learned how to beat a team after failing against them multiple times, and the Bayhawks managed to some out on the better side this time around after a pair of iffy outings earlier this month. That’s going to happen, as it’s tough for anyone, particularly a 11-19 team, to put an opponent away three times in short order.
Of all nights for it to happen, Saturday makes sense. The 905 were without Ronald Roberts due to knee soreness, decidedly their best player and one they’ve struggled without. He ranks among the league leaders in several categories and the 905 have outscored opponents by 18.3 points per-100 possessions when he’s on the floor as a result. They’ve won just one of the seven games he’s missed and have been outscored dramatically when he sits. That’s inflated some by him playing the bulk of his minutes with other starters, but he has the biggest on-off impact on the team, and the 905 missed his energy and rebounding a great deal on Saturday.
Greg Smith started alongside Sim Bhullar in his place, with the 905 opting to bring Raptors assignees Bruno Caboclo and Anthony Bennett off the bench, perhaps to maintain some role consistency for that pair. Smith was decent but didn’t have a major impact inside, scoring seven points with six rebounds before fouling out in 32 minutes. Bhullar, meanwhile, had his first bad game in a while, scoring three points with six rebounds and four turnovers in 23 minutes.
Bennett wound up playing just two minutes before checking out midway through the first quarter. We’re trying to confirm what happened. Caboclo, meanwhile, hit 5-of-10 from outside to continue his recent trend of strong shooting. He’s now 12 for his last 20 and up to 33.1 percent on the season, which is encouraging. He finished the game with 19 points, eight rebounds, and five turnovers, the usual mixed bag. The bag was mixed on defense, too, as Caboclo was forced to play some four, and while he blocked four shots, he also picked up five fouls in 33 minutes. At that end of the floor, the team is looking for him to be in the right spots and making plays rather than avoiding fouls, and his aggression continues to impress. He’s getting there, slowly.
Note: The Raptors recalled Bennett and Caboclo following the game.
Really the only 905er who turned in a strong game was Melvin Johnson, who was 8-of-16 off the bench for 22 points. He’s been hot from outside forever, it seems, and while he doesn’t bring a lot else to the table, the team desperately needed that offensive spark on the bench.
That’s because the regular scorers struggled, as Scott Suggs went 2-of-12 for seven points with six turnovers and Axel Toupane shot 2-of-9. Toupane, who has dropped 30 twice in the last week, finished with 14 points thanks to 11 free-throw attempts, and he’s become a regular DeMar DeRozan in terms of free-throw volume of late. Shannon Scott had seven assists but the Bayhawks know him well enough now to give him a ton of space to shoot and overload him to pass, which put undue pressure on Suggs and Toupane as secondary initiators.
Overall, it was just a poor offensive night. Turnovers remain an issue for the league’s most error-prone team, and their 23 miscues led to 27 points for Erie. Even if they had taken care of the ball, they shot just 38 percent from the floor and 31 percent on threes, hardly strong enough execution to threaten Erie, who led for almost the entirety of the game.
Those turnovers led to some easy offense the other way. Erie shot 47 percent overall and 44 percent on threes, with Myck Kabongo and Jordan Sibert causing havoc by pushing things in transitions after forcing mistakes. Adreian Payne, on assignment from the Minnesota Timberwolves, lived at the line on his way to a 26-11-6-4-0 night, and Canadian Melvin Ejim continued to show terrific growth as a wing ball-handler and creator, scoring 27 points on 10-of-15 shooting and dishing four dimes. I honestly think he’s got a shot to crack Canada’s Olympic qualifying roster with the way he’s looked over the last month.
There’s nothing to get too concerned about here. Head coach Jesse Mermuys will surely be irritated that some of the team’s earlier issues crept back in for a game, but he was also clear after the fifth win on the streak that the team still has a ways to go. A sub-.500 expansion team, however hot, was always going to have another bad night eventually, and it happened to come when their best player was out and one of their assignees was injured early. They’ll get nearly a week off to regroup before trying to get back on the right track against Texas on Friday.
Note: Sorry for the lack of the usual GIFs in this recap. I was having a lot of trouble with my YouTube stream.
