Game #10: Toronto Raptors 88 - Los Angeles Clippers 98

[schmemily]

I didn't anticipate this in the offseason but... I think I enjoy watching this year's team more than last year's team.

Bold statement, but I tend to agree. I love how the Raps invest in player development ... it's the kind of basketball I enjoy watching.

Of course, winning a championship was fun, too. ;-)

[DanH]

Easy to see in retrospect, but making Pascal and Fred the focal point of your offense in the last six minutes of the fourth, when they were both on track to play over 80 minutes in two nights was a mistake. Not having enough lift in their legs and having for force shots could have been anticipated. I could be wrong, because I haven't checked the shot record, but using Fred and Pascal as decoys, and passing off to role players who stepped up big in the early part of the night might have bought a few more baskets. Thomas or Boucher would have been less expected. But overall, can't really complain about Nurses coaching. He did an excellent job. Guys played their hearts out. These two games will pay dividends for the rest of the season.

I kind of think you need to run the offence through Siakam. He was mostly a decoy for a lot of the 4th and the offence was awful. I'd just have sat him longer to start the 4th, see if the rest of the team can keep it close, then go back to him late after an extended break and hope his lungs and legs had a 6 minute push in them. Opening the 4th with Siakam was not the way I'd have gone. We have role players who can plug defensive gaps. We don't have a substitute for Pascal's offence. So if we aren't using him on offence, he should be sitting to get his breath.

[DanH]

Pascal said in the post-game that he was tired and didn't have his normal energy. But he was still needed on the floor as one of the main defenders on Kawhi. Losing OG early had a trickle down effect.

Meh, losing OG does suck, but I think we should have tried to buy Pascal an extended rest to open the 4th. Let Boucher and RHJ go nuts defending Kawhi for a while. If they can't hold us in it, such is life. If Pascal playing would hold us in it, it just leaves him out of gas to close, which ends just as poorly. But if the bench can buy you precious rest minutes for Pascal, you've got a shot.

[Puffer]

...We don't have a substitute for Pascal's offence. So if we aren't using him on offence, he should be sitting to get his breath.

Can't argue with that logic. That eliminates the tiredness issue. Puts a lot of responsibility on the bench guys, but that's how they get experience as well.

[DogeLover1234]

Meh, losing OG does suck, but I think we should have tried to buy Pascal an extended rest to open the 4th. Let Boucher and RHJ go nuts defending Kawhi for a while. If they can't hold us in it, such is life. If Pascal playing would hold us in it, it just leaves him out of gas to close, which ends just as poorly. But if the bench can buy you precious rest minutes for Pascal, you've got a shot.

My criticism so far for Nurse is that hes coaching like its the playoffs. I get you wanna pick some games to go all out and make a statement win, and he was delt a bad hand in this one, but this is unsustainable. Playing Fred and Siakam 45 and 43 minutes on the second of a B2B is just bad coaching. You’ve gotta be able to find time.

[planetmars]

He was running Lowry into the ground too before he got hurt. It's weird.. Nurse seems to be very analytically minded. He has one of the best health guys on his staff, and yet continues to play his guys like Thibs did in Chicago.

Maybe the science has changed.. maybe playing more won't cause long term injury? But it showed last night. We were so bad in the 4th quarter. Fred shouldn't have eaten 20 seconds on the clock only to drive into traffic.. but everyone's legs looked tired.

I suspect Nurse really wanted to win to show the world that we're still champs. I think he has the #Provem mentality. Learn from Kawhi man.. he laced his shoes when it was important. Last night wasn't really all that important. We ended up losing by like 10 or 11 anyway.

[bertarapsfan]

He was running Lowry into the ground too before he got hurt. It's weird.. Nurse seems to be very analytically minded. He has one of the best health guys on his staff, and yet continues to play his guys like Thibs did in Chicago.

Maybe the science has changed.. maybe playing more won't cause long term injury? But it showed last night. We were so bad in the 4th quarter. Fred shouldn't have eaten 20 seconds on the clock only to drive into traffic.. but everyone's legs looked tired.

I suspect Nurse really wanted to win to show the world that we're still champs. I think he has the #Provem mentality. Learn from Kawhi man.. he laced his shoes when it was important. Last night wasn't really all that important. We ended up losing by like 10 or 11 anyway.

I've been thinking about this too. I think there might have been some agreement with nick and the veteran guys who are on short term deals (Trade bait). They knew if we got out to a so-so start there was a high chance masai would change directions and look to trade them. With this is mind nick told them he was going to ride the championship 7 to make sure the team got out on the right foot. Now with the injurys, kyle serges and marc future with the raptors depend on if O.G, Pascal and FVV can keep winning going until we can get the vets back

[inthepaint]

Another takeaway from this trip for me is how Nurse and team have become really efficient in game planing and covering for high-end players. Kawhi didn't just "have a quiet night", the team made that that happen. They did it with extremely well timed, aggressive double coverages, then anticipating where to rotate to when he looked for his open man. And they did that without OG, which makes it even more remarkable. Somewhat similar with Anthony Davis the night before. The team effectively made the night very difficult for both of them.

Aggressive doubles are nothing new in the NBA, what really makes the Raps defence so suffocating and effective is that while these aggressive doubles are employed, the other 3 guys on the floor look extremely alert and anticipating where the outlet pass is gonna go. They're either in a hedged 3-man zone if the they feel the outlet is gonna go to cutter in the paint, or they're hedging to the corner shooter (to either pick the pass off, or be near it to contest the shot). Basically, the goal of every offence is to space the floor, but the Raptors defence has become extremely elite as shrinking it when they're defending it.

The 3 guys not in the double are always pointing, talking and moving their head side to side. It looks like an exhausting system, and every player needs to know their exact role, but that's what Nurse is demanding. That's what champions need. It may sound excessive when you're missing 4 rotation players on a b2b, but defence is about habits. You not gonna do this every night but If they can do that in this kind of duress (they saw AD, Lebron and Kawhi in b2b nights while themselves undermanned), coming playoff with no injuries and the new guys forged into this fire, man, this team will be extremely difficult to score on.

[slaw]

My criticism so far for Nurse is that hes coaching like its the playoffs. I get you wanna pick some games to go all out and make a statement win, and he was delt a bad hand in this one, but this is unsustainable. Playing Fred and Siakam 45 and 43 minutes on the second of a B2B is just bad coaching. You’ve gotta be able to find time.

The team badly wanted that game. He coached his guys to try and get the win. Fell short. They have two games in 5 nights and the early season schedule has been soft in terms of rest days.

This fixation on resting guys in the NBA is getting out of hand. Raps were down four rotation guys last night. Your top guys are going to have to play lots of minutes.

[inthepaint]

Personally, I don't think Nurse is trying to "prove" anything. He's trying to establish a high effort culture (especially on the defensive end), early in the season, because he knows how it takes to win a championship. Once that culture is firmly established, and they have a true, tough-nosed post-Kawhi identity, he'll take the foot off. He's not gonna ride like this vs the Knicks in January.

But there are certain reg season games that represent a true test for your defence. Playoff atmosphere, with real superstarts on the other end (like Giannis, Lebron, AD & Kawhi recenttly). He'll use those to teach the new guys (and reinforce to the old ones), what it takes deep into the playoffs. He'll go hard on those. Nothing wrong with that imo

[S.R.]

Another takeaway from this trip for me is how Nurse and team have become really efficient in game planing and covering for high-end players. Kawhi didn't just "have a quiet night", the team made that that happen. They did it with extremely well timed, aggressive double coverages, then anticipating where to rotate to when he looked for his open man. And they did that without OG, which makes it even more remarkable. Somewhat similar with Anthony Davis the night before. The team effectively made the night very difficult for both of them.

Aggressive doubles are nothing new in the NBA, what really makes the Raps defence so suffocating and effective is that while these aggressive doubles are employed, the other 3 guys on the floor look extremely alert and anticipating where the outlet pass is gonna go. They're either in a hedged 3-man zone if the they feel the outlet is gonna go to cutter in the paint, or they're hedging to the corner shooter (to either pick the pass off, or be near it to contest the shot). Basically, the goal of every offence is to space the floor, but the Raptors defence has become extremely elite as shrinking it when they're defending it.

The 3 guys not in the double are always pointing, talking and moving their head side to side. It looks like an exhausting system, and every player needs to know their exact role, but that's what Nurse is demanding. That's what champions need. It may sound excessive when you're missing 4 rotation players on a b2b, but defence is about habits. You not gonna do this every night but If they can do that in this kind of duress (they saw AD, Lebron and Kawhi in b2b nights while themselves undermanned), coming playoff with no injuries and the new guys forged into this fire, man, this team will be extremely difficult to score on.

I think all that help is partly leading to all the O boards given up. 3 guys collapse on the ball handler, 1-2 of them going for the block, now nobody's boxing out when the shot goes up and you have 6-7 people under the rim and/or the Raps have all sucked into the paint and nobody's positioned for long rebounds. Pro: the Raps have great FG% defense. Con: they're out of position for rebounding.

Also, there's a clear emphasis on getting back in transition which is also great for the D but means they're not getting their own offensive boards.

So hard to win getting out rebounded that badly, even if the rest of the defensive effort is great. Cut the offensive rebounds last night and they win that game.

[planetmars]

The O-boards weren't just because of the defense.. it's poor positioning/boxing out by some of our guys. Especially Pascal and Norm. Here is a quick clip I just found of all the O-boards LA got last night:

[inthepaint]

Yeah, conceded OREBS has been the achiles heel of this team for over a year now. A lot of it it's positioning, but a lot of it is personel too. Without the wing rebounding from Kawhi, when you look at our wings/bigs in general (Gasol, Serge, OG, Siakam, Boucher, RHJ), no one is a particularly strong on the glass individually. Siakam is coming along, but he's instinct as a player has always been leaking out in transition. Our best rebounders (for their positions) are guards (Lowry and Davis).

So they need to find a way to balance that out without compromising their initial on-ball defence (which is one of the best in the league right now), and their transition game (which is also one of the best in the league right now)

[JawsGT]

Gotta be encouraged after that game last night. We lose our best option to guard kawhi in the 1st few minutes of the game and yet they still did a fantastic job on him. Very rough night for kawhi, extremely inefficient and alot of TOs, one for each of his assists. They have a formula for guarding him, so the next challenge will be what to do when PG returns. The positive is we have plenty of defenders to throw at those guys if we meet them and both teams are healthy. OG, Siakim, and RHJ are weapons defensively. Boucher has great energy and no fear, he can make those guys struggle as well. Key guys were missing and perhaps the 2 most important players on the floor, pascal and fred, had accumulated alot of minutes through the 2 LA games. Ladies and gentlemen, we have a fuckin ball team on our hands. This team can compete, it can win and it can get back to the finals. Still need a closer, so lets hope pascal can develop that ability to dominate offensively for stretches of the game, especially in the fourth when everything slows down and tends to devolve into one on one basketball. He's shown flashes of course, but he isnt in the same conversation as the true superstars...yet hopefully. I'm super pumped about this team right now.

[LJ2]

My criticism so far for Nurse is that hes coaching like its the playoffs. I get you wanna pick some games to go all out and make a statement win, and he was delt a bad hand in this one, but this is unsustainable. Playing Fred and Siakam 45 and 43 minutes on the second of a B2B is just bad coaching. You’ve gotta be able to find time.

Yeah, I don't really understand why Nurse has kept the rotation so tight and not used the early part of the season to get the new guys acclimated and building chemistry with the starters. Either he won't stand for letting media get away with writing this team off now that Kawhi is gone, or he feels like he has just as much to prove about why this team succeeded last season.