Raptors 106, Pacers 99 | Box Score | Quick Reaction | Reaction Podcast
At some point – at least in theory – the Toronto Raptors will lose a game again. On paper, it would look something like this: A road game against a quality opponent where the Raptors play carelessly, the bench not having its usual spark, and one or two opposing players go off. A quick look at Thursday’s box score would show a game that certainly fit the bill. A quality Indiana Pacers team hosted the Raptors, forced 19 turnovers, grabbed an early lead, and got 20-plus points from two bench pieces, one of whom rarely plays.
And still, the Raptors won 106-99. This is what they do now. At some point, what’s now the second-longest winning streak in franchise history will end, sure. It’s apparently going to take something stiffer – or, in all likelihood, weirder – to keep the Raptors from toppling yet another team record.
The Raptors got off to a nice offensive start in this one, feeding Jonas Valanciunas in a nice carry-over from the Brooklyn game. He hit a three to open the game, posted up Myles Turner, and drew a foul attacking Turner after delivering a pump-fake. He responded on the defensive end, too, providing a pair of great contests for stops at the rim, including one in transition. While he was turning people away at the rim, his teammates picked him up on the glass, holding the Pacers without an offensive rebound for some time. The defense wasn’t perfect, particularly on an 8-0 Pacers counter-push that saw Malcolm Miller lose Victor Oladipo in transition after he scored on a terrific cut and then Bojan Bogdanovic break loose for a three. Miller would try to make up for it with a great rear-view contest block on Oladipo shortly after, and Kyle Lowry followed up with a three to get on the board and keep the Raptors ahead into the game’s first timeout.
Valanciunas’ touches kept coming, and while he had a hand in a pair of turnovers, he also made a great read out of a numbers advantage on the dive for a Serge Ibaka jumper. The Raptors’ offense took off from there, though outside of a Miller strip of Bogdanovic, the defense wasn’t strong enough to really pull away – DeMar DeRozan, Lowry, and Ibaka all hit threes in short order, only for a careless turnover to let the Pacers pull right back with consecutive baskets. The bench didn’t get any stingier with theball against the ample help Indiana was sending towards the middle, allowing for a 9-0 closing run. The Raptors wound up with eight turnovers in the quarter, almost the sole reason they found themselves in a two-point hole after one even though they had significant edges in shooting percentages and on the glass in favor of Toronto.
The second didn’t get off to any better of a start, with Poeltl getting whistled for an iffy and-one on Al Jefferson and Fred VanVleet getting the same treatment opposite Lance Stephenson. Dwane Casey was displeased, and the continued lack of shot-making for the Raptors and Al Jeffersoning for Al Jefferson for the Pacers saw Indiana stretch the lead to seven, the rare negative stretch for the Toronto reserves. Casey trusted the group a while longer, and they settled in a little bit from there outside of Jefferson continuing to work Poeltl and VanVleet taking a knee to the head. One play warrants specific pointing out, as Delon Wright and Pascal Siakam both faked out Stephenson on the same possession, eventually leading to a Siakam dunk. Naturally, Stephenson responded with a dunk, then drew an offensive foul.
Casey opted for a near-wholesale change from there, bringing four starters (and soon, a fifth) back in to try to swing the balance back. The stars were both able to get to the line with sharp cuts to the net – Valanciunas had a nice feed to DeRozan – but the Raptors continued turning the ball over, delaying a speedy comeback. It almost came, it was just more methodical, requiring the Raptors to string some stops together and Valanciunas to finally breaking through again with a big dunk on a rim-run. The Raptors were nearly all the way back until DeRozan picked up a technical foul and Jefferson returned for an injured Turner (he has a high ankle sprain, which is awful) to continue his throwback evening, stroking a pair of long jumpers to already reach his second-highest point total of the season. Valanciunas missed a couple of tough looks through contact at the buzzer, and the Raptors went into the break down eight again, sunk by 11 turnovers and the unruly Jefferson performance.
The Raptors couldn’t apply their halftime adjustments out of the gate, almost immediately driving into inside pressure and committing three straight turnovers. It was a minor miracle the Pacers didn’t run away with it in the opening minutes, with the Raptors defending mostly well around their frustration with the officials to keep things within striking distance. The offense came around despite being in their own way with some curious decision making, with an aggressive Ibaka drive, Valanciunas work on the glass, and a DeRozan three helping stay tight. There was just no answer for Jefferson, who continued stroking jumpers and pump-faking defenders into 2008. Oladipo continued making some tough shots against a really good effort from Miller, too (Miller had the second-best D-Rating on the team and Oladipo’s numbers took a noticeable dip opposite him).
Casey let the starters try to figure it out for nearly nine minutes before beginning to turn to the bench, only down six at the time since the defense had mostly picked up with the offense cooling off. When he did go to the bench, it was to get a quick look at a Siakam-Ibaka frontcourt to change up the coverage and try to deny Jefferson the ball by fronting on the block or sinking to prevent anything over the top. They also had a play-call ready designed to attack Jefferson with DeRozan almost immediately, producing an and-one. Siakam attacked Jefferson right after, too, capping an 8-0 run that pulled them back within one. Indiana responded by going small themselves, even as Poeltl returned, drawing a foul on an offensive rebound to stay within two entering the fourth.
Based on precedent, this would have been where the bench swung control to the Raptors. Initially, Indiana continued applying heavy defensive pressure, grinding Toronto into the half court and forcing some tough shots and, not surprisingly at this point, turnovers. C.J. Miles chose the right time to heat up, hitting a pair of threes (on essentially the same play) sandwiched around a Darren Collison three, opening the window for the Raptors to take their first lead since the first quarter on Wright free throws. Miles continued his week of unseasonably warm fourth-quarter shooting, hitting another triple off of a nice Lowry kick-out born from a Siakam offensive rebound. With the Pacers going nearly four minutes without scoring despite some good looks, the Raptors railed off a 9-0 run.
The close-out wouldn’t be as easy as a pull-away from there, as Miles appeared to injure his left elbow on a fall at the rim (he’d return later). Casey went to a Wright-and-starters look in response – a lineup that I really like but hasn’t had great results yet – and Lowry went into momentary takeover mode after a rough nigh to this point, hitting a tough fading three, scrambling everywhere on defense, grabbing offensive rebounds, and then drawing a foul to stay a few possessions ahead in the final minutes. Ibaka did the exact opposite, making a number of questionable choices in the closing stretch and continuing his shaky fourth-quarter shot-making. The league’s best fourth-quarter defense did a solid job for most of crunch time, but a Collison three after a tough DeRozan possession still had Indiana within a possession with 26 seconds remaining. DeRozan hit a pair of free throws, then came up with a steal and a dunk to effectively end it.
And like that, the Raptors have a 10th consecutive win (one off the franchise record), their 17th in the last 18 games, and their eighth in a row on the road. It was a familiar story here, with the difficulty dialed up – play a sloppy first half, take some time to find a groove, and shift gears in the second half and take control back. That the Raptors were able to do it on the road against a red-hot team fighting for home-court advantage in the playoffs says a lot more than doing so against inferior opponents did, and Casey continues to show an ability to tweak things on the fly to find the right groups and schemes for the occasion. The team’s composure and decision making in clutch situations has improved as the year’s gone on, too, and while there haven’t been enough instances of games staying within five points for the net rating to normalize, the Raptors are now 21-13 in games that are within five points at some point in the final five minutes.
With each passing game, each passing win, each passing rotation tweak or next-man-up performance, the Raptors leave fewer and fewer questions that they could conceivably answer before mid-April. On Thursday, it was whether their occasionally casual approach in first halves would doom them against stiffer competition. A few more tests are coming. This was the first of five games in seven days, there are two each left against Boston and Cleveland and one against Oklahoma City, and the Raptors need to work OG Anunoby back in at some point. These are wrinkles and tune-ups, though, not grand philosophicals. The Raptors are very good, even against good teams, even when that’s not necessarily true all game.
