TORONTO – Dress it up any way you might like, but there was no escaping a simple fact as the Toronto Raptors readied themselves for Game 2 of their first-round series against the Milwaukee Bucks.
It was a test. Pass or fail. No marks for a good try. No do-overs. It was for keeps.
Kyle Lowry couldn’t afford another stumble. Dwane Casey needed to be sharp and decisive.
The role players, who can so comfortably ride the coattails of Lowry and DeMar DeRozan so many games, needed to make shots in order to thwart a Milwaukee game plan designed to take the Raptors stars out of the game.
There was no margin for error.
They passed.
Their superstars delivered like superstars. Their role players dug in. Casey made some adjustments that paid off. Mostly, they played like their playoff lives were depending on it and they had every extra effort rewarded, every hard screen fought through made worthwhile.
But it was close as the 106-100 final margin would suggest.
It was as close as seven-foot-and-forever Giannis Antetokounmpo backing down maybe six-foot Lowry in the post with less than a minute left and the Raptors up by two.
“I was praying that Serge [Ibaka] would come over and help,” said Casey.
But Lowry held his ground. He forced Antetokounmpo to kick the ball out for a perimeter look that didn’t go down, with DeRozan skying for the rebound.
It was one of those games that was close from the first possession. Hard fought. Every inch of floor a battle zone. It was playoff basketball and after seemingly failing to acknowledge it in Game 1, the Raptors can look themselves in the mirror after Game 2 and know they were ready for the fight.
Most of all, they could look to Lowry and know that he was ready to play. Ready to snarl.
“Being aggressive,” said Lowry by way of explaining his turnaround from four points and 11 shots in Game 1 to 22 points on 12 shots in Game 2, along with five assists. “My teammates challenged me, like I said before and I got to the free-throw line nine times. Got aggressive early and the second half … for me, it was just going out there and playing.”
The Raptors looked like they might be home and cool when P.J. Tucker hit a corner three to put the Raptors up 95-83 with 8:36 left, but the Bucks kept coming – a moving, swarming collection of long bodies that shrink the court just by being on it.
They had already come back from a 13-point hole in the third quarter, helped along as the Raptors briefly “lost their minds,” according to Casey and coughed up four of their 13 turnovers in the space of three minutes. This time around the Bucks reeled the Raptors in by increments – through no glaring fault of the home side – until Antetokounmpo hit a triple from the top of the circle to tie the score 100-100 with two minutes left.
DeRozan (23 points, seven rebounds) gave the Raptors the lead again with one of his patented long, contested, crucial two-pointers and Toronto had the chance for some breathing room after six-foot-five Tucker outmuscled Antetokounmpo for a defensive rebound, drawing a foul in the process.
But with the ACC crowd roaring, Tucker missed both his free throws, walking back to the bench during a timeout with his jersey over his face.
It would be OK. Lowry was there to bail him out.
The same Lowry who was a non-factor in Game 1. The same one who seemed to sag under the weight of the expectations placed on him at times.
After guarding Antetokounmpo in the post – “we don’t like that switch,” said Casey – it was Lowry who stepped up to drop the anvil on the Bucks. The same Lowry, who looked hesitant in Game 1 in putting up just 11 shots, letting the Bucks dictate his game, showed why the Raptors need him to be aggressive.
After DeRozan got rid of the ball while facing a Bucks double-team – the kind of smart decision-making that marked most of DeRozan’s night –Lowry was isolated against the Bucks’ rookie Malcolm Brogdon. He dribbled hard at him, backed him off and hit a step-back to put the game away with 8.9 seconds left.
“For me, I just wanted to get to my spot,” said Lowry. “I knew there was five seconds on the shot clock, I wanted to get to my spot. Get to my spot and let it go. At the end of the day, I work on my shot almost every day. So if I missed it, I would have still been happy because I got to my spot.
“But I was gonna try to make it.”
It was a relief as much as a success. Such is the lot of being the higher seed, the more experienced team. But it was a triumph, too, as the Raptors were fighting not only a resilient Bucks team, but their own ghosts as a favourite who can’t take care of business at home despite the adoration of crowds packed inside and outside the building.
The test was real and so were the consequences of not coming through.
Going down 0-2 is near certain death in the NBA — according to WhoWins.com, you’re going to lose the series 93.6 per cent of the time.
The urgency was there. Casey is the furthest thing from knee-jerk during the regular season, but he made the point that he couldn’t afford to not be on Tuesday night.
He would be watching the opening moments of the game closely and wouldn’t hesitate to react if he didn’t like what he saw from a team that was too soft, too accommodating in Game 1.
A year ago, trailing 0-1 to the Indiana Pacers and losing by double figures heading into the fourth quarter, Casey benched a badly struggling DeRozan in favour of Norman Powell. Desperate times, desperate measures.
He didn’t do anything that drastic but he did bring rookies Jakob Poeltl and Delon Wright in for important minutes in the first half and was rewarded as the Raptors were able to push a 28-25 first-quarter lead to eight for stretches in the second before a scrambled finish to the half allowed the Bucks to keep it to three, 55-52.
[relatedlinks]
As well as Lowry and DeRozan played, the win likely turned on the Raptors getting 12 threes from rotation players other than Lowry – Serge Ibaka, playing on a gimpy ankle he wasn’t sure would survive the game, had four of them as he scored 13 of his 16 in the second half. Cory Joseph had three while DeMarre Carroll, Pat Patterson and Tucker combine for five more.
They were the result of smart ball movement initiated by DeRozan and Lowry, a contrast from Game 1.
“Their length is their strength,” said Lowry. “So once you get in the paint, they’re all in there trying to kick out, and we gotta make shots. It was there.”
Said DeRozan, who finished with only three assists, but likely had several more hockey assists, as he was making the pass that led to the pass that led to the shot: “Just watching film, understanding how they’re attacking me defensively, trying to put ‘em in rotation. They’re sending two guys at me every time I come off the screen. Try to get off it quick, trust my teammates to make the next play. We did a great job of doing that tonight.”
The defence was there too. When the Bucks’ Khris Middleton tried to spin baseline on Tucker late in the fourth quarter he was met by a quick double-team by Cory Joseph. Middleton called a panicky timeout and even after the reprieve the Raptors were able to force a five-second call on the inbounds. In all, they held the Bucks to 41.4 per cent shooting and if they didn’t shut down Antetokounmpo, the Bucks’ multi-faceted superstar, they made him work as his 24 points came on 24 shots, a fraction of them in transition where he’s so deadly.
But the person who needed to prove he was prepared most urgently was Lowry. For all his struggles in Game 1 – four points, 2-of-11 shooting, an overall lack of his trademark forcefulness – the fact remains when he plays well in the post-season, the Raptors typically do thrive.
He’s averaged 23.2 points, 5.8 rebounds and five assists in the Raptors’ 13 post-season wins during his tenure, while shooting 43 per cent from the field and 35 per cent from deep.
In Toronto’s 19 losses over that same period, Lowry averages just 14.8 points, 4.5 rebounds and 5.3 assists while shooting just 33 per cent, overall, and 22 per cent from three.
When it was all said and done, Lowry was Lowry. Ready to take the load.
They passed the test. Their reward is another one in Game 3 in Milwaukee on Thursday night.
