The Toronto Raptors are 38-26, firmly entrenched as a top-four seed in the Eastern Conference. But that standing belies the real state of Dwayne Casey’s team, which has dropped nine out of its past 10 games following Tuesday’s 117-107 loss to the San Antonio Spurs.
At least Toronto has begun to realize just how dire its straits are, right? After the game, team leader and All-Star starter Kyle Lowry ripped into the Raptors’ performance with a calm yet expletive-laced tirade.
Here’s Lowry via Josh Lewenberg of tsn.ca:
“It’s nine [losses] out of 10 [games],” Toronto’s all-star responded, irritated at the implication they might require added motivation following this latest loss, 117-107 to the defending champs. “[Expletive]. We need to play. We don’t need no kick in the ass. We’ve literally been getting our ass kicked.”
Informed of his point guard’s harsh critique, coach Dwayne Casey lauded Lowry and expressed a desire for more players to take responsibility for their team’s struggles.
“I was glad to see somebody had a give-a-crap level,” Casey said of Lowry, who finished with a hollow 32 points, nine of them coming in the game’s final 20 seconds. “That’s what it has to be about and it shouldn’t be just one guy. I should have two, three, or four guys upset and teed off that we are playing that way.”
Toronto trailed surging San Antonio by an embarrassing score of 61-39 late in the second quarter. Broadcast cameras caught Lowry laying into his team for a lack of effort during a timeout just minutes before, and his emotional speech likely carried over into the locker room at halftime.
Hardly by coincidence, the Raptors performed far better over the game’s last 24 minutes – even cutting the Spurs’ lead to seven points with ample time remaining. But the hole they dug was too deep to climb out of entirely, and the clock ran out on their comeback bid.
Though Toronto’s play has certainly reached a nadir, its been in a funk since becoming talk of the league in December. The Raptors are just 14-18 in the new year and have their sterling 24-8 start to thank for such solid playoff positioning. Consensus was that Casey’s squad would bounce back to prior form from an early January slide upon DeMar DeRozan’s return from injury mid-month, but that’s hardly been the case.
Despite winning streaks of six and four games, the Raptors are only 13-14 since the former All-Star wing began playing again on January 14. His presence was supposed to alleviate defensive concerns that crept up while he was out, but instead they’ve persisted. Toronto’s defensive rating over that timeframe of 104.1 ranks just 21st in basketball.
Good news for Toronto is that its schedule lightens down the stretch – April is basically a half month of cupcakes. But good vibes gleaned from beating inferior opponents only matter so much, and can muddle a far more dispiriting reality. If the Raptors don’t start to play well soon, it seems their early season dream of title contention will indeed prove just that alone.
[tsn.ca]