Scottie Barnes stars, Collin Murray-Boyles & Alijah Martin support in thrilling overtime win against 76ers
“It’s not easy. I give them a lot of credit.” Coach Darko told me of his smaller team playing up against bigger squads of late. He said that shortly after, with a fairly disappointed face, updating us on the tweaky reality of Jakob Poeltl’s back injury. The back injury that was downplayed, managed, and maybe finally, surrendered to. It’s true the Raptors have been smaller than they’ve wanted this season, it’s part of why there’s whispers about backup bigs they’d like to target via trade, but with the injuries to RJ Barrett and Brandon Ingram stacking on top of one another, you could make the case that they’re not only small right now, but offensively limited.
The Raptors needed someone to throw on the cape, maybe a few people, at least in part.
It was 40-33 for the Raptors when you could see a boisterous Barnes backpedaling down the court, big cheesin’ for the world to see. He had just thrown a pass down to Collin Murray-Boyles for a layup to tally his 5th assist in 15 minutes of play. He was happy to find Murray-Boyles for an easy look to reward how much work the young rookie had been putting in on the glass. Similar to other games in this recent stretch, CMB had been fighting and giving his life to the matter of rebounding. Some of those extra possessions he nabbed found their way into the hands of Barnes, who was scoring brilliantly in the first rush. He tallied 16 points before he took his mid quarter rest in the second frame. Through a myriad of drives, seals, and crashes, Barnes was giving an offensively depeleted Raptors team a lot of what they needed. Nearly half of their buckets at that point of the game.
I reflected upon the Raptors of the past with Nick Nurse before the game. Talking about his team’s mad dash for turnovers, offensive rebounds, transition buckets, and the possession battle. Some of the NBA’s most important trends right now, only earlier.
“I wish I could say I was doing it to be a pioneer, but it was a necessity. The truth is I knew that team didn’t have a whole lot of shooting and would struggle to score the ball sometimes. So, we came out with that approach.” Nurse told me. “We crashed like hell. We played fast.”
The Raptors of today are definitely not the pioneers of the league’s most pervasive style, but they do partake. Very comfortable in turning teams over. Ratcheting up ball pressure. Playing for transition and trying to live there. They’ve been a below average offensive rebounding team on the season, but in this game they had Alijah Martin creating extra possessions in addition to Murray-Boyles. The Raptors undersized 2-guard, or appropriately sized point guard, was harkening back to an older version of his game to fit in for the Raptors. Martin did have some bring up ball handler possessions, but the Raptors had him floating near the paint, ready to chase rebounds or finish at the rim off laydowns.
“The way I play the game, it’s not like I’m uncomfortable. I’ll take what the game gives me. If they put me in the dunker I feel like that’s easy to make reads. I’m already close to the basket, and I can see the floor.” Martin told me this summer. “That’s probably where I’d be more comfortable. In high school I actually played down there my first two years. My coach had me in the post, cause I had an old school coach. Like, he was a back-to-the-basket, this and that, mid-range, no threes guy.”
Martin, who has had very little run with the Raptors this year (but has been essential for the 905) was actually the Raptors minutes leader off the bench in the first half. A game against the 76ers and their explosive backcourt necessitated a bit more guarding punch in the backcourt for the Raptors, and so Martin played – and played well. Considering the Raptors had him out there as an option on Tyrese Maxey and VJ Edgecombe, the 3 extra possessions he nabbed for the Raptors on the glass, and the 6 points he scored were an extremely welcome addition to his sticky defense.
The start of the second half was poor from the Raptors. Little in the way of composure from their lead ball handlers, run out opportunities for the 76ers, and a little bit of shot making from Philly saw the home team lose their 10-point lead that took 24 minutes to accumulate, evaporate in 3 minutes. It was great then, that Murray-Boyles who had been doing a great deal of rebounding of late, and not so much scoring, managed to piece together a few buckets to help keep the 76ers at bay. They can expect nearly 50 points a game from their backcourt and you can’t expect to keep the water off forever. They were having more trouble than usual to start the second half, so Martin checked in again. His first defensive possession of the second half featured a closeout on Maxey, and a sequence of defensive slides with him that forced him to kill his dribble early and miss a fader. Good stuff. Great, even. Not much great would come afterwards in the run to close the quarter.
Neither team was hitting many shots. Definitely not the Raptors. At least, for the 76ers, they were going to the free throw line. Adem Bona and the 76ers were drawing heaps of loose fouls on rebounds. That’s what those 6 minutes of basketball seemed like. Both teams miss, one team scores, and at the end of it the Raptors were stuck 8. 84-76, and doubled up in the third (36-18). A fourth quarter against Maxey, Edgecombe and their boundless live dribble creativity on the way.
Good things came expeditiously for the Raptors to start the fourth quarter. They came, Quickley. A tidy 10-2 run (7 points from Quickley) in the span of two and a half minutes brought them back within 1.
It was the ferocious pursuit of the offensive glass by CMB & Battle that put the Raptors back out in front for the first time in a while. Not to mention CMB’s ability to paper over defensive breakdowns (with sheet metal instead of looseleaf) proving to be a major asset on defense. Coach Darko opted to give the keys to Jamal Shead, who had been pretty strong to that point of the game, to run offense and drive the Raptors while Barnes & Quickley sat. It went very poorly for the Raptors, but it wasn’t really the fault of Shead. He was just leading a fairly offensively challenged unit (CMB-Lawson-Mamu-Battle) and Battle’s usual spark plug scoring fell flat (1-3 from the line, missed layups, missed triples).
The Raptors geared up with a final lineup of Quickley-CMB-Martin-Barnes-Shead to make their final charge.
They had Barnes to score. CMB to do… everything else. And they had the rest of the guys circling in support. They closed the 5-point gap in spectacular fashion. Forcing turnovers, fighting the 76ers for every inch of the hardwood, and with a booming poster from Barnes. 99-99 with two and a half minutes to go.
The NBA’s 3rd leading scorer (at north of 30ppg) stood near the logo possession after possession looking for Quickley. At first the Raptors allowed the matchup, then they started pre-switching him out of it, but Maxey still scored on Barnes who stepped up. On the other side, a moment that might’ve been glory became nothing as the refs called a travel on Barnes when the expectation for he and the Raptors was an and-1. A huge swing, and it was immediately followed by an absolute gut punch of a step back triple from Maxey to go up by 4 with 20 second left.
These Raptors battle, though, They scrape. They claw. And they did. Forced turnovers, BLOB jumpers, and mad scrambles saw them into overtime. Alijah Martin, who forced the biggest turnover in the fourth quarter, blind doubled Oubre for a steal to open up the final frame. 6 stocks. 4 steals and 2 blocks at that point.
The unfortunate part of it all, was that the Raptors killed themselves to get there, but still having to contend with Maxey’s unreal shot making ability. After he scored on Quickley in a pinch post action, the Raptors opted to start doubling to get the ball out of his hands. The Raptors were down 4 at this point.
It was Murray-Boyles who grabbed an offensive rebound before finding Shead for three. It was Murray-Boyles who blanketed Maxey for a tie up and won the subsequent jump ball. Finally, it was Murray-Boyles who worked the dunker spot and dunked (appropriately) two possessions in a row after drop offs from his point guards. A massive swing in what was a dominant performance from the Raptors rookie.
With lots of room for rookie glory, Edgecombe took a swipe for some of his own. He ran the 2-man action on ball instead of Maxey, and he flattened out to hit a pull up triple in the face of Martin to tie the game at 115. A tremendous pull.
With 15 seconds left, the Raptors had the ball to win it. Their first look was a pinch post for Barnes on Maxey. Maxey, overwhelmed by Barnes’ rip through and physicality, fouled on the ground. The Raptors would take the ball out to the side once again. This time with 6.3 seconds to win it all.
Barnes ran a keeper play (think of the famous Jonas Valanciunas play) to turn the corner. He didn’t see an advantage so he backed out to iso and drove Oubre Jr. to the basket. He finished his shot, but the refs called the and-1 off. Barnes went to the line where he hit the game winning free throw and quickly banked the second off the rim to run out the .8 seconds on the clock.
They went through the gauntlet to get there, but the Raptors finished it out.
“Resilience. We fought. We battled.” Barnes said after the game.
No kidding.
Have a blessed day.
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