Gameday: Bucks vs Raptors, November 1

Challenges await the Raptors right out the gate this month. It’s choose your own adventure time!

Raptors’ next 5 games:

vs Milwaukee
at Philly (2nd night of b2b)
at San Antonio
at Dallas
at Boston

So, yeah, not taking care of business against a (previously) 0-3 Blazers team on the 2nd night of a back-to-back really hurts. A 1-8 start to the season is very much in play.
— Josh Lewenberg (@JLew1050) October 31, 2023

Bucks scope (2-1, 4th in East | Offensive Rating: 11th | Defensive Rating: 27th)

This is the Bucks first road game of the season. It’s a little early for rankings, but Milwaukee has to work out the kinks after losing an elite perimeter defender in Jrue Holiday.

Giannis Antetokounmpo has been his normal self. Damian Lillard bounced back from a six point game against Atlanta with 25 vs the Heat. Khris Middleton is leading the team in assists (4.5 per game) despite only averaging 16 minutes. Middleton had knee surgery in the offseason and doesn’t expect to get back to his regular workload until sometime next week.

This is also the return of former Raptors assistant coach Adrian Griffin, who spent the previous five seasons in Toronto.

Raptors scope (1-3, 15th in East | Offensive Rating: 30th | Defensive Rating: 2nd)

We’re past Halloween but it’s been scary hours for the Raptors offence so far this season, evident by their dead last offensive rating.

Raptors points per-100 in the halfcourt so far this year:

72.0
74.7
87.5
75.0

Last year they averaged 94.5, 25th in the league. League average was 98.4 last year.

Would be tolerable if offensive process looked solid. It has not.
— Blake Murphy (@BlakeMurphyODC) October 31, 2023

On a positive note, Scottie Barnes has lived up to the year three hopes so far. He leads the team in points (20.8), rebounds (9.5) and blocks (2.5) while also dishing out 5.5 assists per game. His shot mechanics are quicker and he’s been comfortable scoring in all areas.

Gradey Dick has earned crucial fourth quarter minutes in back to back games by doing a lot of little things on both ends that don’t show up on boxscores.

The Raptors have alternated great three point shooting nights (11-25 vs Minnesota, 17-32 vs Philadelphia) with awful ones (9-38 in Chicago and 4-29 against Portland). Does that mean threes will fall tonight?