Yawn.
Kyle Lowry has been named the Eastern Conference Player of the Week for the week ending March 20, the team announced Monday.
In five games, Lowry averaged 27.2 points, 6.4 rebounds, 6.8 assists, and 2.2 steals while shooting 46.8 percent overall and 47.1 percent on threes, getting to the line an average of 11.8 times per-game. The Raptors went 4-1 in that stretch despite being without Jonas Valanciunas for all but nine minutes, being without DeMarre Carroll, losing Patrick Patterson for a game, losing James Johnson for a few, and getting rest for DeMar DeRozan (Lowry responded by going 25-4-11-2 in 28 minutes) and Cory Joseph (18-5-7-3 in 40 minutes). He averaged a league-best 10.8 fourth-quarter points this week and now ranks eighth in the NBA with 6.8 points per-fourth on the year.
It’s Lowry’s second time earning the nod this season (Feb. 29), fourth time as a Raptor (ranking behind only Chris Bosh and Vince Carter with seven apiece), and fifth time overall, to go long with the Player of the Month award he shared with teammate DeRozan for January. Lowry’s also earned an honorable mention every month except for December and is yet to have what could reasonable called a bad week – he hasn’t even scored in single-digits once yet this season, and his longest stretch of going without 20 points is three games, which has only happened twice.
He’s been remarkably effective and consistent and, to be quite honest, has to be on or near most five-man Most Valuable Player ballots. He’s led the 48-21 Raptors to the No. 2 seed in the East through some rather difficult stretches of injuries, averaging 21.9 points, five rebounds, 6.4 assists, and 2.2 steals, all while hitting 39.5 percent of his threes and playing the third-most minutes in the NBA. He’s been an absolute workhorse, and sure, Joseph helps spell him on defense at times which lets him ballhawk, but his defense has noticeably bounced back after a tough 2014-15, and he’s the offensive and spiritual heart and soul of perhaps the best Raptors team ever.
If you like to quantify such things, Lowry ranks sixth in the NBA in Real Plus-Minus based-Wins, fifth in Win Shares, third in Value Over Replacement Player, and sixth in Nylon Calculus’ DRE metric.
Kyle Lowry Over Everything, all day, every day, week after week, month after month.
