The Toronto Raptors took home-court advantage back on Saturday, evening their opening-round series with the Milwaukee Bucks at 2-2. It’s not exactly the way they’d hoped to assert control over the first four games, but at this time of year, the bulk of what matters lies only in the result. The how is important for figuring out the next game and the next adjustment and projecting for a next series, but it’s the how many that carries weight at the end of the day. At the end of Saturday, the Raptors had swung things back in their favor, ready to head back home for Game 5 on Monday.
To wit, teams with home-court and a 2-2 tie through four games have gone 135-37 in NBA history, a 78.5-percent clip. FiveThirtyEight gives the Raptors a 67-percent chance at winning the series, and ESPN’s BPI puts it at 75 percent. The Vegas line implies a 69.7-percent probability of Toronto winning. So ugly though it’s been, they’ve turned models, history, and the market back on their side.
But they still have to come out and win, which has been a real problem for this Raptors core in the postseason. They coughed up Game 2 after winning Game 2 here. Last year, they were 3-5 in games following a win (excluding when the series changes, otherwise that’s 3-7). In 2013-14, they were 1-2 after a win. And they’ve never won three straight playoff games, because they’ve struggled to even rail off two in a row. A lot of this is because winning is hard in the playoffs, and they’re up against comparably good teams. But it also means that if that pattern holds again here, their backs will be up against the wall in a serious way.
The Raptors are talking this up like just as big a game as it is. They’ve called Game 5s and 6s Game 7s in the past, and head coach Dwane Casey pointed out his team’s penchant for relaxing after wins on Monday. That won’t fly here. The Bucks won’t allow it.
The game tips off at 7 on NBA TV (Spero Dedes, Grant Hill, Richard Hamilton, and Jennifer Hale) and TSN on TV and on TSN 1050 on radio. You can check out the full game preview here. Your officials are James Capers, Pat Fraher, and Courtney Kirkland.
Required reading
Here’s what you need ahead of Game 4, assuming you haven’t been keeping up.
- Game 4 recap, Game 4 video breakdown, Game 5 preview.
- On Norman Powell’s Game 4.
- Over at The Athletic, I wrote about what moving Serge Ibaka to center opened up for the Raptors.
- Raptors Republic readers can get 20 percent off a subscription by using this link.
Raptors updates
Kyle Lowry missed shootaround due to a stiff back but is expected to play tonight. He was feeling better this afternoon than he was this morning, but Casey said the team will see how he feels after going through his pre-game routine before making a call on him.
Cory Joseph is under the weather and likewise expected to play. He wasn’t brought up on the injury report or in Casey’s pre-game, so this note probably isn’t even worthwhile. It’d be interesting to see if Joseph or Delon Wright would start if Lowry sat, and if Joseph’s not in top shape, Wright could see a larger share of the backup minutes otherwise.
Check back before tip-off for updates, because all of the analysis leading up to today drastically changes if Lowry misses the game.
UPDATE: According to the lineup sheet handed out, Lowry will play. Exhale.
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Coaches can rarely win. Make the right adjustment and it came too late. Make a good adjustment but there’s one more to be made. Sometimes, I think we underestimate the difficulty of real-time rotation tweaks and lineup juggling, and that there are only 48 minutes in a game and a cavalcade of factors weighing into each sit/start/play decision. At the same time, I feel little remorse for constantly speculating on potential tweaks to the rotation, because it’s the most tangible thing we can use to evaluate decision-making, and, well, it’s been a weakness of Dwane Casey in the past.
Saturday, he took a large step forward by moving Jonas Valanciunas into a bench role and lining up the bulk of his minutes opposite Greg Monroe. That vaulted Norman Powell into the starting lineup to give the team more options with Khris Middleton and Giannis Antetokounmpo, and it seemed to work for Valanciunas, too, as he turned in his best performance if the series. Casey has another option to goose the starting lineup further, sending DeMarre Carroll (along with the team’s second-worst defensive rating and net rating in the series) to the bench for P.J. Tucker, who has been terrific defensively in the series. It has not sounded like Casey is primed to do that in Game 5, but he’s played his cards close before.
In any case, Carroll’s role has been minimized in the team’s two victories, and to hear Monroe tell it, we all make way too big a deal about starting lineups anyway (I don’t disagree, except in the case of a team that constantly starts slow). Here’s a look at the Raptors most commonly used lineups in the series:
PG: Kyle Lowry, Cory Joseph, Delon Wright, Fred VanVleet
SG: Norman Powell
SF: DeMar DeRozan, P.J. Tucker, Bruno Caboclo
PF: DeMarre Carroll, Patrick Patterson, Pascal Siakam
C: Serge Ibaka, Jonas Valanciunas, Jakob Poeltl, Lucas Nogueira
TBD: None
ASSIGNED: None
OUT: None
Bucks updates
Khris Middleton is dealing with an illness but will play tonight.
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The talk over the last two days has been about the Raptors trying to anticipate what moves the Bucks may make. The Raptors made a handful of smart adjustments, and now it’s Milwaukee’s turn to tweak in response. (I had a great conversation with Rex Kalamian on Sunday about what goes into anticipating these changes, and how much preparation goes into that aspect of the gameplan.) The Bucks don’t seem like a good bet to drastically change their rotation – Toronto has already basically forced Mirza Teletovic and Spencer Hawes out, and they’ll likely target Jason Terry next – and Kidd almost can’t make it any tighter than the seven different lineups he used Saturday.
That doesn’t mean they won’t be making schematic tweaks, and the Raptors can probably expect Milwaukee to work to get Antetokounmpo the ball on the move more often. The Bucks actually thought it was a lack of movement rather than too much passing that led to their turnover issues in Game 4, and swinging the ball around effectively is a good way to try to exhaust Toronto’s switchier defensive lineups.
PG: Malcolm Brogdon, Matthew Dellavedova, Gary Payton II
SG: Tony Snell, Jason Terry, Rashad Vaughn
SF: Khris Middleton, Michael Beasley
PF: Giannis Antetokounmpo, Mirza Teletovic
C: Thon Maker, Greg Monroe, Spencer Hawes, John Henson
TBD: None
ASSIGNED: None
OUT: Jabari Parker
Pre-game news and notes
- Casey was asked if the Raptors will try to embrace winning ugly, but he hammered home the need to be versatile and play whatever style the game dictates. Basically, they’d like to score more, but if it comes down to grinding it out on defense, they’ll be ready. More than anything, Casey wanted to emphasize that offense or defense, the start is important
- On Patrick Patterson, Casey said his limited minutes Saturday were just based on the game situation. He once again emphasized that Patterson, Carroll, and Tucker will continue to share minutes in a fluid manner based on performance each game, particularly with respect to defense on Antetokounmpo.
- Kidd, sarcastically, on Middleton being ready to go while ill: “We’ll play him 48 minutes.”
- On the job Powell did on Middleton: “Powell gave ’em energy. He did a really good job on the floor when he was on the floor. We have to account for him. he’s not just a guy that can play defense.”
Assorted
- I’ve been posting some pics/quotes/updates to my Instagram story, since I don’r have Snapchat. You can follow along there, too, if you’d like.
- Here are today’s shirts in the red-out at the ACC:
Game 5 shirts pic.twitter.com/HWkFMlYfRM
— Blake Murphy (@BlakeMurphyODC) April 24, 2017
The line
Game 1: Raptors -7.5 (Series Raptors -350) (Bucks 97, Raptors 83)
Game 2: Raptors -8 (Series Raptors -165) (Raptors 106, Bucks 100)
Game 3: Bucks -1.5 (Series Raptors -225) (Bucks 104, Raptors 77)
Game 4: Bucks -2.5 (Series Raptors +130) (Raptors 87, Bucks 76)
Game 5: Raptors -5.5
Series: Raptors -230 (implied probability of 69.7 percent)
Whether it’s Kyle Lowry’s back, the flow of the series, or information learned since last week, the market has really cooled on the Raptors at home relative to the series openers. The Raptors are favored by two points fewer than at the beginning of the series. Some of that may be Lowry’s back stiffness, but the Bucks have outplayed the Raptors on the whole, and there seems to be an adjustment here (the Raptors opened as 6.5-point favorites and the line came down). The over-under is way down at 191, with the series averaging 182.5. It will be interesting to see if any Lowry news bumps the line.
