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The ‘amazing’ Biyombo, minor injury updates, and other post-game notes

I just hope Bismack's...uhh...unmentionables are OK.

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Well that was significantly more fun than the first two games. That was…incredible. Well worth delaying a Saturday night for. That was the Toronto Raptors team most of us expected to show up for this series, and while THAT kind of a result should never have been expected, the fight and execution the Raptors showed in Game 3 were awesome. This was the team everyone fell in love with all year, and moved the goalposts for from a first-round win to legitimate contending. There’s still a ton of series left and a long road ahead of them, but if THIS Raptors team shows up for the next few games, Cleveland has more of a series on their hands than they maybe expected heading into Saturday night.

Bismack the god

I can’t think of an individual role player performance I’ve ever enjoyed more than Bismack Biyombo’s record-setting seven-point, 26-rebound, four-block performance in this one. He was everything on the glass, he was great as a rim protector, he was used as a one-on-one defender against LeBron James (and whom suggested that?), and he really set the tone as far as toughness and unpunkability.

“Oh, he was huge. I thought he had a big-time game in the paint,” Casey said after the game. “He’s the spirit of our team.”


One note on Biyombo, though – he picked up a Flagrant 1, and he now has three flagrant points in the series. One more flagrant and he’ll receive a one-game suspension. So tread lightly while being an absolute badass.

Minor injury updates

Biyombo took a shot from Dahntay Jones in the unmentionables. He seems OK.


Irving appeared to be injured in the fourth quarter, possibly hurting himself upon landing after contesting a Cory Joseph shot in the paint.


DeMarre Carroll’s also banged up with yet another scrape. It doesn’t sound serious, but it’s something to keep an eye on.

Lineup notes

The Cavs starters played to even over 22 minutes. It was uncharacteristically their bench units that struggled, including the Benchnit Termites, who were a negative (minus-1 in five minutes) for the first time in the series.

The Raptors’ starters, meanwhile, were a minus-one in 13 minutes, and the Luis Scola experiment still isn’t working, but if the Raptors feel like it’s helping their rotations and rhythym, well, who am I to doubt El Dwaney? (If you get that reference, we can be friends.) The Raptors’ three next most-used lineups combined to be a plus-16 in 21 minutes (they all involved Patrick Patterson, who was terrific tonight).

Assorted

*Jimmy Goldstein was at post-game availability!

*Think you were mad at the officials? I think Casey swallowed a gallon of blood biting his tongue in his post-game availability…and then he gave in, and he’ll probably be fiend $25,000 for it as a result.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wZOfclKLRzQ
*Never let it be said that James isn’t a good quote (and doesn’t know his hip-hop).


There don’t seem to be hard feelings from the second-quarter dust-up.



*The Raptors were good, BUT…no buts, man. This was great, unless you’re going to throw your own wins out with “but the Raptors had bad games.”


This is the better response:


*Man, I would have expected Irving to be the one needing sunglasses indoors the way he looked Saturday…


*This is awesome:


*Let’s end back on Biz, who is the greatest.

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