Why The Raptors Should Fear The Deer
By Chris Wooden
Toronto’s Falling Stars
Last season, the Toronto Raptors made playoff noise and played the Cavs tough in spite of their stars, rather than because of them. DeRozan and Lowry were rightful All-Stars after both turned in career best years.
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Two All-Stars, both of whom had legitimate arguments for starting for the East (DeRozan did start but Lowry lost out to Kyrie Irving and instead made the game as a reserve), is usually more than enough to win a first round playoff series. But the Raptors’ duo has yet to play like consistent All-Stars in the playoffs. To date, Lowry has one of the worst field goal percentages (38.2%) in NBA Playoff history after turning in a 2-11 performance and finishing with a paltry four points.
The joy of having two stars is that there is a safety valve if one turns in a bad game. Unfortunately, not far behind Lowry on that magnanimous list is DeRozan, who put up 27 points in Game 1, but on 21 shots at a 33 percent clip. That’s not going to cut it, not against a hungry Bucks team ready for this stage. Bad shooting nights happen, but for the Toronto duo they seem to happen far too often in the playoffs.
The sample size is small, but there isn’t necessarily a track record to suggest they’ll revert to regular season form in Game 2. With Casey’s stubborn reliance on ISO sets for DeRozan and Lowry long 2s or three-pointers, they need their stars to play like stars, and they’ll need more of Serge Ibaka’s offense (he was the lone bright spot for Toronto with 19 points and 14 boards) to help create space for DeRozan.
It would also be nice to see more from Patrick Patterson than three points in 16 minutes. For Toronto to move on, they need to hit the reset, and Lowry and DeRozan need to exorcise their playoff demons.