When a team has lost 15 consecutive games, a hyperawareness sets in about the different ways a loss can come about. A missed open three feels like the last clean look that will ever be generated. A five-second inbounding violation feels like several turnovers at once. An offensive rebound surrendered feels sure to result in an immediate three. It’s not until the final buzzer sounds that a deep exhale can escape.
On Friday in Milwaukee, the Toronto Raptors earned permission to let that breath out.
The 117-111 win against the Bucks means this version of the Raptors won’t tie – or even break – the longest losing streak in franchise history, which stands at 17. More than a month since their last win, the Raptors got to celebrate a job well done and let the heavy weight of losing, and the heavy spectre of infamy, off their shoulders. The record itself may not matter to each individual, but it’s certainly something the team as a whole would have liked to avoid, especially so late in what’s been a difficult season on many fronts.
To get there, the Raptors had to turn in their best performance in weeks, as you’d expect.
This is a Bucks team that’s struggling right now, to be clear. Giannis Antetokounmpo was out, as was Patrick Beverley, and while Damian Lillard returned to action, he fouled out with two minutes to go, preventing his 36-point night from swelling to true Dame Time. Milwaukee has now lost five of six, including three in a row to Washington, Memphis, and Toronto, arguably the worst three-game losing streak any team will have this year, on paper.
Still, Lillard existed for 46 minutes, and despite the 15-16 record under new head coach Doc Rivers, even a shorthanded Bucks team would be expected to outman this Raptors group on many nights. (To wit: The Raptors were 15-point underdogs.)
The Raptors had to earn it, and they did so by taking advantage of the position the Bucks find themselves in. Toronto played like a team desperate to end a long losing streak, something that’s been missing at times the last month, and the spirit they played with caught a call-us-for-the-playoffs veteran rotation on their heels. Toronto led by as many as 14, and even had their first halftime lead in 11 games. They turned 13 forced turnovers into 18 points the other way, kept the second-chance points battle close enough, and, while they were sloppy themselves with the ball, got enough outside shooting to make up the difference.
Getting Gary Trent Jr. back in the lineup alongside R.J. Barrett and Immanuel Quickley made an expectedly large difference. That trio had only played together in two of the team’s 15 losses, due to personal absences for Barrett and Quickley, minor injuries for Trent, and Barrett not playing back-to-backs. Having your three best offensive weapons on the floor together made the offence look like an entirely different team at times, with Barrett’s paint pressure, Quickley’s pick-and-roll verve, and Trent’s shooting all working in concert. Quickley was an assist shy of a triple-double, and the triumvirate combined for 82 points on just 52 shots; Trent hit 7-of-15 on threes while the former Knicks took 26 free throws between them. Trent also had one of his livelier defensive games.
The return of key pieces shifts everyone else into a more suitable role, too. Players fresh from the G League weren’t asked to start, and Kelly Olynyk could play like Kelly Olynyk instead of Snapback Sabonis. Ochai Agbaji was back, too, and his defensive effort level was through the roof.
A six-point win wasn’t without its challenges, of course. Other than some solid minutes from Gradey Dick (at least when he wasn’t stuck guarding Lillard on a switch or semi-transition mismatch), the bench gave them almost nothing. Bench-heavy minutes were what let the Bucks get back into the game in the second half, and the rotation necessarily tightened. The fact that players who were playing 30 minutes for most of March looked overmatched in smaller bench minutes here is instructive; it’s no mystery why the Raptors lost 15 in a row.
In short, this version of the team isn’t the one that lost all those games. Barrett, Quickley, and Trent played four, eight, and 10 of those 15 games, respectively. Dick and Jordan Nwora were the only players to play in all 15. Scottie Barnes and Jakob Poeltl played in zero. Chris Boucher played in two before his injury, and he’s the only player to have an even remotely positive plus-minus over the last six weeks (Barrett is the “best” regular with a minus-13.1 net rating in his limited time).
The Raptors played 18 different players during the losing streak, and while it’s valuable developmentally to cast a wide net and expand player roles at times, only a handful of those 18 will play the next round of meaningful basketball for the team.
Elsewhere in the NBA, Memphis and Portland both won, meaning the Raptors’ victory simply kept the reverse standings as they were. With five games to go, the Raptors are three games clear of either team; there’s a possibility they could have “caught” Portland by losing out, but that seems unlikely, and there is value in getting a win on the board to avoid an historic losing streak, then turn the focus back to lottery positioning.
The Raptors needed this. With such a trying season, welcoming Barrett and Quickley back has been a bright spot, emotionally, and you could sense how much getting a win together meant, too. Quickley was fiery late, talking with the crowd at times. Trent was diving for loose balls with abandon. Agbaji, fresh from an injury on a similar play, was skying for every rebound in his radius.
Everyone understands how the Raptors found themselves in such a losing streak, even if the macro conditions that led to a rebuilding season are occasionally murky. They made win-later trades, they lost their star and their starting centre potentially for the season, they lost other players to smaller injuries, family tragedy, and league investigations. They have rarely been competitive, and rarely looked like a Raptors team you’ll remember, save for the potential trivia value of Wednesday’s record-setting loss.
On Friday, they didn’t have to be that. They were a plucky underdog, with only a few rotation absences, trying to stun a championship hopeful stuck in April mud. They hit big shots, they fought hard, and they stuck together even as a double-digit lead turned into a small deficit late. They were a version of themselves that they can project forward with a semblance of optimism that just hasn’t been there for nearly a quarter of a season.
It's just one game. One game that keeps them out of the franchise history books and lets the final five games play out without a cloud of ignominy.
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