Pascal Siakam: B
Didn’t do a great job boxing out Porzingis, but fared a bit better when the Latvian pulled him out on the perimeter. Nice game offensively, and hey, even hit a mid-range J!
Jonas Valanciunas: B-
Noah was pretty fantastic on Valanciunas defensively, but on the flipside, Jonas also limited Noah on the other end – which may or may not be that impressive. Efficient from the field, faced early foul trouble which reduced his minutes. Classic Jonas.
Kyle Lowry: A-
Struggled from the field, but man, as we expect from him, he does everything on the floor. His decision-making with the ball was tremendous and made Rose work on the defensive end. In the third quarter, he had an amazing defensive sequence on Melo to force a turnover. He was the only Raptor starter with a positive +/- in the first half. My only complaint with Lowry was that he let Rose blow-by him a bit too easily which led to easy buckets for the Knicks.
DeMar DeRozan: A+
Won’t lie, I really did not see him breaking the 30-point mark after his cold start offensively. Shame on me. His shooting percentage improved as the game went on, particularly after a monstrous third quarter where he took matters into his own hands. That running floater was on all night, and his ability to draw fouls never ceases to amaze.
DeMar with the floater on the break #wethenorth pic.twitter.com/eIHkF2JMCK
— Sam Holako (@rapsfan) November 13, 2016
Norman Powell: B
He was – dwarfed – by Melo on the defensive end, which made it very difficult for Norm to contain him. You can be somewhat forgiving of that, given that he’s been such a great defensive stopper all season, and there was only so much he could against Melo who’s one of the toughest guards in the league. Offensively, Norm was a big contributor, and he’s hitting three’s at a nice rate right now.
Patrick Patterson: A
I’m forgiving of his field-goal percentage because he looks so confident with his release, and he did so many other things tonight other than being a spot-up long-range shooter. He was an instigator offensively, got inside, and played pretty good defense on Porgzingis.
Patterson penetrates, draws the double, then hits Bebe with the shovel pass for the easy lay-in #wethenorth pic.twitter.com/G2SBzxrDrU
— Sam Holako (@rapsfan) November 13, 2016
Terrence Ross: B+
Had a really solid stretch as soon as he came into the game and was a spark plug on offense. His swagger all season is encouraging.
Lucas Nogueira: A
It seems so silly now that so many people had declared that Bebe ‘lost his place’ due to Poeltl’s emergence. Fantastic work-rate from Nogueira tonight. There were moments where he had trouble in the defensive scheme, losing New York’s bigs and hedging too far from his man down-low. Overall though, this was a great performance: put-backs, great hands defensively, boards, and an incredible block on Carmelo in the fourth quarter.
Bebe with another put-back…amazing! #wethenorth pic.twitter.com/sKue8PlNJU
— Sam Holako (@rapsfan) November 13, 2016
Cory Joseph: B
Very, very tame night offensively. He didn’t score a single field goal in 20 minutes despite having good looks, and his only point came from the free-throw line. Had a nice defensive performance, though.
Dwane Casey: B+
I wanted to see a better adjustment made on Carmelo after he roasted Norm in the first half, but his hands were somewhat tied given that Carroll was out of this one. He ran good plays down the stretch and the Raptors probably would’ve pulled away sooner had they hit more of their – very – open looks.
Three things we saw…
1. Jennings and Rose got inside far too easily which led to defensive collapses and easy looks for Porzingis and O’Quinn. The defense as a whole wasn’t consistent, and given how awful the Knicks were defensively, the Raptors really made this closer than it should’ve been given how disjointed they were through stretches of the game.
2. It’s funny. So many fans were pointing out the Raptors’ squad ‘regression’ this off-season, but it becomes more and more clear every game that the Raptors had improved because of the leaps that DeRozan, Ross, Powell, Bebe, and Valanciunas have made or in the process of making. This team’s spine is growing daily.
3. The free-throw discrepancy was staggering, and perhaps a testament to looks the Raptors were getting. DeRozan made more free-throws (13) than the Knicks did (12), and got to the line 38 times!
