The Raptors were in a fight for their lives versus the Los Angeles Lakers without Luka Doncic. Austin Reaves dominated. LeBron James and his streak ended. Scottie Barnes was sensational, but the Raptors’ clutch offense wasn’t, and Rui Hachimura made them pay with a game-winner.
In the video above, I broke down why the Raptors lost in this game and why their clutch offense might need to change.
Here’s Samson Folk recapping the game and Reaves’s dominant play:
As much as things started to come together for the Raptors offense, they still had no solve for the ultra crafty off-kilter wizardry of Reaves, and the efficient duck-in offense that Ayton was able to carve out for himself working off of Reaves’ attention. They were getting carved up. They had to switch a lot of actions to try and keep Reaves out front, and the Raptors were getting killed on the back end of those plays by the Lakers size. The striking distance they worked themselves back into evaporated as they were staring down a 12-point deficit with 2 minutes left to go in the first half. Ingram’s shot making stalled and died, so where did the Raptors look? They put on their brightest oranges and went hunting. They targeted Reaves with Barnes on switches. A good idea, and one the Lakers would have to provide a thoughtful response to coming out of halftime, but doing so with a 9-point cushion.
Scared to switch, by the way, the Lakers allowed Barnes a bit more space and he scored 9 straight points for the Raptors. Reaves was incorrigible though, and consistent in powering the Lakers offense forward. The Raptors threw a lot of attention his way, a few different looks, and Walter was giving everything he had to contain him – but to no avail. It was nice then, that a Walter triple in transition was what knotted the game up at 79. The make brought him to 17 points on 10 shots, and a team high at the time.
The Raptors scraped and scrapped their way back in to it. A lot of contributions from a lot of different places. The Reaves thing came up again, though. Raining hellfire from downtown, dropping the ball to bigs, and terrorizing the Raptors in general – they had no adequate response defensively. Reaves had unleashed every part of his game to the effect of 36 points on 16 shots through 3 quarters. JJ Redick had played him 32 of a possible 36 minutes and the Lakers held a 2-point lead heading into the final frame because of it.
It was a difficult opening stretch of the fourth for the Raptors. They battled, they forced misses, but they had an incredible amount of trouble corralling rebounds. It kept the Lakers offensive possessions alive, it kept the Raptors from running out in transition, and it kept the clock ticking, bringing the Lakers ever closer to bringing Reaves back in to run their offense.
Reaves checked back in with roughly 8 minutes to go and a 3-point lead. A triple from Battle tied the game shortly after. Showtime.
It was a great Battle stretch, by the way. Cutting, filling, hitting jumpers. He put up 10 points on 4/5 shooting in very short order. The Lakers collapsed to other Raptors, and Battle was there time and again to finish plays.
Unfortunately, the Raptors offense kept falling to the hands of Ingram. In the past, yes, Ingram has had clutch time success, but coming into this game he was 7-21 on his mid-range pulls, stacking up turnovers, and was part savior/part contributor to the Raptors offensive woes since Barrett went down. In this game, he was slow to initiate plays, slow to move the ball on, and he was missing his shots.
The Raptors found a bit of a reprieve with Barnes in the pinch post. He drove a double, dragging the Lakers defense, and opening up a 45 cut for Mamu, who finished an And-1. A transition layup from James tied the game up at 118 – and brought his scoring total to 8 on the night.
The Raptors last look of the night was an Ingram drive on Ayton, which bounced harmlessly off the glass before the Lakers collected the ball and readied themselves for the last possession.
Ultimately, it was a blitz on Reaves, with James as the release man, who drove middle and passed to Rui Hachimura in the corner for a buzzer beating triple to win the game.
James’ streak of 10-point games came to an end while making a pass to a game winning shot. Poetic, really. Given how much of his early career was dominated by his willingness to make those types of passes instead of taking the last shot at all costs.
Also, Reaves had 44 points on 21 shots with 11 assists. Unbelievable. Even if I have questions about his whistle.
