The crowds are only just back at Scotiabank Arena after a long absence, but the fans fell silent in the opening moments of the Toronto Raptors‘ game against the Detroit Pistons on Thursday.
On his first touch of the game, Raptors rookie Scottie Barnes grabbed the ball and drove hard down the baseline with his right hand, looking to put down a dunk that would have got the fans out of their seats early.
But Pistons centre Isaiah Stewart wasn’t having it. The second-year bruiser made a hard play on the ball and put the newly crowned Eastern Conference rookie of the month flat on his back.
Talk about a tone setter. Or at least that’s how it looked early.
But Barnes set a tone himself. After a few moments on the floor to collect himself, he got up and took his free throws and the nearly full house let out a collective sigh of relief behind their mandatory masks.
Barnes reset things when he made a point of showing that Stewart hadn’t got into his head either, as he collided with him on two more attacks in the paint in quick succession and saw Stewart go to the bench with three quick fouls.
Barnes has plenty of talent, but he’s got much more than that. It shows in moments like that, when he is fouled hard, gets up and takes it right back at the guy who put him on the ground in the first place.
On another night against another team, it would be a story unto itself: gifted-yet-gritty rookie gets knocked down and gets back up stronger.
But it turned out there were plenty of occasions to cheer, roar, chant and boo to come.
It was that kind of night.
This is, after all, Pistons-Raptors. There are too many things going on, not the least of which is what is now a four-years running question: can the Raptors ever beat the Dwane Casey-coached team across the river from Windsor?
With about 14 minutes left in the game, it certainly appeared the answer was ‘no’. Again.
It was at that point of the game that Raptors head coach Nick Nurse picked up two quick technical fouls for vehemently arguing what appeared to be a clean block by Raptors forward Chris Boucher. It was not the best night for Marc Davis’ crew as both Nurse and Casey had each already used and won their coach’s challenges.
Nurse made the walk back to the Raptors locker room with his team trailing by 18.
His team did him proud from there, and so did Barnes. The big rookie took former Raptor Cory Joseph to the block, spun and dunked to cap an 18-6 run that followed Nurse’s ejection. Toronto was down six with 6:35 to play.
But the Raptors couldn’t push it home. Pistons rookie Cade Cunningham wasn’t going to be outdone by Barnes, his old high school teammate. He capped a brilliant night with a late put-back to put Detroit up seven with just over two minutes to play and then blocked Gary Trent Jr.’s layup in the final seconds as the Raptors tried to finish the comeback with a late flurry.
They couldn’t and instead fell 108-106 to Detroit, dropping to 0-3 against them on the season and 3-9 since Casey was fired by the Raptors and hired by the Pistons, with his former assistant, Nurse, getting the Toronto job.
The battle between the coaches is one thing but the battle between the star rookies was even better theatre as Cunningham led the Pistons with 21 points, 12 rebounds and five assists, while Barnes provided 21 points and 10 rebounds for the Raptors, who were led by Pascal Siakam’s game-high 28 points.
It wasn’t enough as Toronto fell to 34-28 and Detroit improved to 16-47.
“I thought we had a segment there were we were just really not switched in defensively at well,” said Nurse. “We were really giving up a lot at the rim in the first quarter, we were giving up both — we were giving up [shots at the] rim and we were giving up uncontested [perimeter] shots.
“Again, just not quite switched in enough to guard and it dug ourselves a [hole] … not quite enough offensive production, too.”
The refs were a factor, undoubtedly as they sent the two teams to the line for 64 free throws combined, but the Raptors shot 36 of them to 27 by Detroit. Had Toronto shot better than 7-of-26 from three, perhaps the outcome would have been different.
Granted, the Raptors were short-handed: OG Anunoby has been ruled out for two weeks to let a fractured finger on his shooting hand heal up, Fred VanVleet missed his third straight game with a bruised knee and Thad Young was held out with non-COVID related illness.
But the Pistons are the Pistons. They came into the game ranked 30th on offence and 26th on defence.
For whatever reason they turn into a juggernaut against the Raptors. They put up 127 points against Toronto in a win in November and held the Raptors to 87 in a win in January.
“They certainly play good and have played really good against us in different stretches,” said Nurse before the game. “And we haven’t played as well. I don’t really have any explanation for it. We just need to do better.”
Said Casey: “Someone said something about getting hyped up [to play Toronto]. We get ‘a’ win I’m hyped, no matter who it is. There’s nothing to that … it’s one of those things.
“It’s just one of those things.”
It keeps happening though.
The Pistons and Raptors has turned into a pretty good rivalry. There is the history between their head coaches – there were hard feelings after the Casey firing and Nurse hiring.
That the Pistons have dominated the series between the two teams since helps fan the flames.
And looking ahead, having two brilliant rookies – Barnes, taken fourth overall and Cunningham, selected first – should guarantee plenty of interesting matchups in the years to come.
The 2021 rookie class is deep and talented and perhaps even better than advertised when the star power was supposed to be limited to the top four.
Barnes is proof. There were some raised eyebrows when the Raptors selected him fourth overall with Jalen Suggs still on the board. In plenty of other seasons, Barnes would be a runaway favourite for rookie of the year.
He’s turned into a brilliant pick, as anyone paying any attention knows. His rookie-of-the-month award barely covers it. He leads all rookies in minutes played and with averages of 14.8 points, 7.5 rebounds, 3.3 assists and 1.1 steals ranks in the top five of his class in all four categories and grades out even higher in advanced stats. In his first four games since the All-Star break, Barnes is averaging 20.8 points and 8.8 rebounds a night on 72 per cent shooting.
But Barnes is unlikely to win the rookie-of-the-year award. It’s no fault of his, it’s just there have been excellent performances throughout the draft class.
“It’s a big-time class. [No. 1] all the way down a lot of guys have played really well. [Evan] Mobley in Cleveland has played really well,” said Casey. “I’m biased because I think Cade is playing excellent basketball. It set him back missing training camp, but I still think he’s top on the list just because he sees the floor, he’s a leader, he has that ‘it’ factor. Someone asked me, [Kyle] Lowry was like that. He had that ‘it’ factor. In close games he makes big buckets, he makes big plays, talks in timeouts and practice so that I’m impressed with Cade with that.”
Barnes will get to measure himself against some of the best in the next few days. In addition to Cunningham – his high school teammate at Montverde Academy in Florida – Suggs has picked up his game with the Orlando Magic, who are in Toronto on Friday. On Sunday, the Raptors travel to Cleveland where Mobley, taken third overall, has emerged as the favourite for the rookie-of-the-year award for his all-around play on a surprising Cavs team.
Cunningham set a high bar on Thursday night, but Barnes wasn’t going to be outdone.
The Pistons came out the more purposeful team as they jumped out to a 31-22 lead in the first quarter. It was Casey’s club which moved the ball well and easily clogged the paint on Toronto, forcing the Raptors to shoot threes that they kept missing. Detroit finished the period on a 15-6 run that had the fingerprints of its star all over it. Cunningham hit cutters, scored on drives through the lane and stepped into open threes and even drew a charge on Pascal Siakam as he led both teams with 10 first-quarter points.
Barnes helped get the Raptors on track in the second quarter. He scored six of 10 first-half points in the final minutes of the half as the Raptors clawed back from down 12 early in the second quarter to head into the half trailing by a more manageable 60-57 thanks to Barnes assisting on a Gary Trent Jr. triple just before the buzzer.
But Cunningham and the Pistons kept coming. Cunningham had eight points and the Pistons held Toronto to 7-of-18 shooting while forcing five turnovers as they pushed their lead to 18 by the time Nurse had to make his long walk.
His team made it interesting from there and Barnes did his best to be the top rookie on the floor, which wasn’t easy, given how Cunningham came to play.
But in the end it was Casey winning at Scotiabank Arena again, same as it ever was.