The Raptors and Murray-Boyles teach the meaning of fandom in Game 4

“He got it. Hard! He just shake the basket,” says my four-year-old son Elliott as Scottie Barnes dunks in transition. Later, Barnes dunks again, this time because his hot 3-point shooting so far in the series has forced a closeout. “Red got it!” shouts my son, his arms raised high in the air.

Is this what the start of fandom looks like? 

I’ve never seen anyone become a fan before. I know what losing fandom looks like. I watched it in myself over the last decade as this spectacular, incredibly fortunate position in which I find myself has increasingly become a job. Still an incredibly fortunate one to have. But a job nonetheless. 

Now he’s dunking his hot wheels into his spiderman hat. “Yes!” he squeals. James Harden makes a shot, unobserved by Elliott. 

Meanwhile, the Raptors are slowly, slowly digging themselves a hole they will slowly, slowly dig their way out of. Jamal Shead rips the ball away from James Harden in isolation. He’s too fast, too strong, too hungry. Ja’Kobe Walter isn’t making shots, but he’s snatching rebounds, diming up teammates, winning the fight for loose balls. Brandon Ingram is continuing to suffer the consequences of being Monstar’d.

Eventually, he will break loose. It will come. But to bridge that gap, the Raptors’ defence has to carry water for now. 

For a time, the rhythm of the game is syncopated and harsh like a Philip Glass song. Toronto gets a stop, misses an uncontested shot. Steal, miss, Toronto gets an offensive rebound, misses again, another offensive rebound, turns it over. The game can’t spread its wings, or the Raptors won’t let it. Barnes bulldozes his way to points, and Collin Murray-Boyles eventually does, too. But the Cavaliers build something of a lead, a handful of points, seemingly insurmountable in a game like this. For a time, the question is whether Toronto can crack 30 points at half. 

Elliott has lost interest, is now actively trying to distract me from the game. Fandom cuts more ways than one, it turns out. 

Then Ingram enters the game — in truth, the series

. He isolates and finally hits a jumper. He drives for free throws. The Raptors get into transition — it hasn’t been particularly difficult for them to get into the open court in this game, just to score in it — and Ingram drills a wing triple. He ends the half by hitting a one-dribble side-step, buzzer-beating monster of a triple.  

Neither team has made even a quarter of its triples. No one is comfortable. The game is being played on a rocky beach in bare feet. Everything is just as Toronto wants it.

Elliott’s brief flirtation with fandom has ended. He is now happily playing with some cars in the corner of the room as the Raptors wince and run across those rocks. His Hot Wheels are being launched by Paw Patrol trucks to make some miraculous rescues.

Barnes and Jarrett wrestle in the post. It’s completely unclear who is on offence (Barnes), but he is called for a foul as the two battle. Ingram’s momentum has carried into the second half. He misses a pull-up, is blocked on a step-through. On the other end, Mobley is isolating and scoring over Jakob Poeltl while Harden walks into layups in transition. Toronto’s brief first-half lead has dissolved into an enormous four-point lead for Cleveland. 

But momentum doesn’t carry over the halftime barrier. Cleveland doesn’t drive into the front as much as Toronto slowly recedes. At first, things are fine. Poeltl drives into Allen, playing several feet away from him, for an and-1 finish. Barnes plays defence like a demon, a maniac, a monster. He doubles, deflects, races towards closeouts. For all of the heroics of his teammates, Murray-Boyles’ defence and rebounding, Ingram’s run to end the half, it is Barnes holding back the flood from Cleveland to allow those moments to his teammates. 

But he can only hold so much together. Cleveland subsists on free throws, shot at a sub-50-percent rate, which is more efficient than anything Toronto can muster on the other end. Missed layups, missed jumpers, missed chances. This game couldn’t even convince a four-year-old to care about basketball. 

Murray-Boyles is shooting 4-of-9 from the field, which is the most efficient scoring the Raptors are getting from anywhere. He is blocked by Mobley, who loses the ball out of bounds, and another offensive rebound ends up in Murray-Boyles’ hands. He shoots 1-of-2 from the line, as good as it’s gonna get for Toronto right now. Cleveland airballs the next look. This isn’t a brick fight. That would be a technological upgrade. It’s a fight in the mud, both combatants half-drowning as they saw at one another with their fingernails. Damage is minimal, but even the lightest amount of contact is a victory.

Sandro Mamukelashvili toilet-bowls a ball into the rim after two, three pumpfakes, and Barnes splits some free throws. Murray-Boyles blocks an end-of-quarter attempt. It is enough to drive the stadium into a frenzy, Elliott out of the room entirely to play outside, and the Raptors into the lead. 

Of course, it is then that the game finally gains a rhythm, if only for an instant. The bass line kicks into gear, Barrett scoring, Barnes dunking, Cleveland hitting some shots, too, but not enough. Barnes is increasingly strangling his opponents’ offence, as he guards everyone, rotates, switches, contests, and somehow rebounds the ball, too. This stretch would have been exciting for Elliott, but that ship has sailed. I’ll take what I can get on that front. 

Toronto punches its lead to five, with Murray-Boyles soon to enter the game. The Raptors have mostly been trying to survive their minutes with him sitting in the series and dominate those with him on the floor. His plus-minus leads the game at that point. 

Instead, the Raptors face another obstacle, another hill, another deficit. Mitchell hits a stepback triple, then Harden one from the corner. A swooping, avian Barnes misses a layup on the other end. And the Cavaliers’ tiny spurt of gas has given them a lead. For Toronto, yet another five-point deficit feels like another Sisyphisian impossibility in this game with only one nostril above the waterline. 

Murray-Boyles throws in a putback dunk, but Mitchell splashes in another triple. His four at this point are more than the entire number of 3-point makes the Raptors have managed. Ingram turns it over after wasting a possession trying to isolate, later misses a pull-up. Later, Murray-Boyles grabs an offensive rebound, but Toronto misses. A minute later, Murray-Boyles grabs another, this time resulting in an Ingram triple. Everything is flowing through the rookie at this point. The Raptors are aflame in the crucible, but Murray-Boyles alone walks unharmed. 

No one knows it at the time, but he will carry Toronto across the finish line. Perhaps everyone knows it at the time.

A spinning Barrett layup drags Toronto within a point, then Barnes and Shead force an eight-second violation. Murray-Boyles’ teammates have joined him. Forty seconds, down one, Raptors’ ball. The final obstacle. Barnes tries to dunk, arms fully extended, Allen helpless looking up at the Raptor above him. He settles for free throws, and makes them. It is Murray-Boyles, dancer, ballerino, bull, who is isolated against Mitchell and forces a miss on Cleveland’s last chance.

Now the series is tied. Now Cleveland is drowning in the physicality and defensive intensity of Toronto. The series is a meatgrinder, and Toronto’s bones are stronger than Cleveland’s flesh. The Raptors, led by Murray-Boyles and Barnes, have dragged Cleveland into the stone age, where the two teams simply batter at one another with clubs. The Raptors didn’t win as much were the last man standing in this one. 

Elliott was long gone. But for one brief, shining moment, he was cheering beside me. Toronto has ensured he’ll have another chance to cheer for his team soon. For Elliott, for the Raptors, it is a start.

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