Quick Reaction: Raptors 110, Blazers 98

Mamu got the call for the start tonight and his play was brilliant. He was effective as a pick and popper, he was effective as a pick and roller, his post craft was as good as it’s been all season, and defensively he helped contain Clingan and corral offensive rebounds as well.

Scottie had an unbelievable 6 blocks, and was a large part of why Toronto wasn’t too overwhelmed by the size of Donovan Clingan. His timing, and help defense were on point for most of his minutes, and he used his length well to challenge shots at the rim, and provide nail help as well.

Quickley had a lot of craft finishes tonight, wrong hand finishes, underhand finishes, floaters in the lane, he practically lived in the lane tonight and his speed led him to get all these great looks and finish.

Ingram took some really tough shots tonight, but when he found himself with single coverage he was able to get a clean look off and knock it in. He was more hands on tonight than he’s been in recent games, and with a lineup filled with shooting, he found ample opportunity to look for his own shot, which was pretty successful.

You could see Barrett was a bit rusty tonight, he left some points at the free throw line, he missed all 5 of his attempts from outside, and overall he just wasn’t getting to the rim as much. Granted he only played 21 minutes due to it being his return game from injury, but you can definitely tell he is getting back into game shape.

Ochai did all of his scoring at the rim, and he did it fairly loudly. He caught a lob from gradey and slammed it down with force, he had a putback layup when Portland failed to box him out, and he found the ball in transition for another dunk as well. His defense was solid tonight also, especially as a weak side help defender, he seemed more attentive on that end.

Gradey had a fairly sound and encouraging game. He was perfect from behind the arc, as he hit a couple of above the break threes, he filled the lane in transition well and was a pretty active cutter. He even had a nice dunk in transition as a result of his activity, so a pretty solid game for Gradey overall.

Pretty strange game for Shead, he only got up one shot attempt which was a missed three, he never really hunted for his shot, often killing his drives early and looking for outlets to swing the ball to. He was still driving most of the time he got the ball, but he was not finding lanes that he thought would be suitable for shot attempts, nor was he finding the rock in transition either.

Inserting Mamu into the starting lineup was a good call, his shooting and on-ball skills made it tough for Donovan Clingan to camp in the lane as much as he’d like.