Toronto Raptors: How the Raptors build a championship team
By Jade Johnson
Development
The 2015-16 season saw the expansion of the G-League (then known as the D-League. PS, I still hate this name change.) when MLSE announced that they had purchased a team that would be called Raptors 905. 905 is such a great play on words in several ways. First of all, the team plays out of the Hershey’s Center located in Mississauga, Ontario who’s area code is 905. It’s also a play on Drake’s popularization of calling Toronto the 6ix based on its 416 area code.
But that’s not all. It’s a nod to the many many Raptors fans don’t live in Toronto proper. The Raptors 905 is the only G-League team whose name does not represent some city or other geographical location. The 905 area code completely surrounds the city of Toronto. And in the way that the Raptors being the only NBA franchise outside of the United States makes them permanent outsiders, even as NBA Champions, there’s symmetry in the idea that the Raptors 905 is part of the Raptors but still outside of Toronto’s borders.
The addition of the 905 to the Raptors’ overall strategy has paid off in spades. Delon Wright, Norman Powell, Fred VanVleet and Pascal Siakam have all spent time playing for Raptors 905 and but for its existence, Fred VanVleet may not even be an NBA player, much less a key contributor to the Raptor’s Championship win.
Norman Powell
The Milwaukee Bucks drafted Norman Powell 46th overall but the Raptors acquired the right to the pick in the Greivis Vasquez trade. Had Powell not had the opportunity to play extended minutes for Raptors 905, he may never have developed his game enough to become the reliable role-player he is.
Sure, if you base your opinion only on Powell’s 7.1 point career average, it’s easy to be underwhelmed. But the times when he’s been tapped to be in the starting lineup paints a very different picture. His 2015- 16 season was littered with, Did Not Plays, Inactives, and minimally productive bench minutes. Then on March 15, 2016, Powell was added to the starting lineup against the Chicago Bulls where he would remain for the rest of the season.
In what was only Powell’s 4th career start against the Chicago Bulls, he scored a career-high 17 points. And he would go on to record four more career highs during the remainder of the regular season, peaking at 30 points in the Raptors’ last game against the Brooklyn Nets.
The surprise of Raptors’ fans quickly changed to excitement once we were able to see what Powell could do with more playing time in a series of consecutive games. My husband absolutely LOVES Powells game. So much so that when we adopted a kitten that spring we named him, Norman.
But even if Powell isn’t scoring in the double digits, he has a role to play with the Raptors and he maintains a single-minded focus on it. Energy. If you ever come across a post-game interview with Norman Powell in which he does not talk about bringing energy, unless you provide me with a link to the video, I will not believe it exists.
It’s one of the points he’s just always going to make, even if it’s not the direct answer to the question he’s been asked. He knows that it’s a really important part of what he contributes to the team. The difference in the whole unit’s play is immediate and obvious whenever Powell takes the floor leading to one of his nicknames, Stormin’ Norman.
During the 2019 playoffs, Toronto Raptors’ play-caller Matt Devlin could be heard referring to Powell as Playoff Powell. I can’t specifically remember the first time that nickname was used but if I had to guess, I would say it was during the 2017 playoffs. After averaging 8.4 points in the regular season, he went on to score in the double digits in six of the nine games he played peaking with 25 points against the Milwaukee Bucks in Game 5 of the first round.
And while Powell’s numbers and minutes in the 2019 playoffs weren’t as high as in some previous seasons, Matt Devlin could still be heard excitedly making play calls for Playoff Powell when he made clutch plays at critical moments. And the nickname has expanded well beyond Matty D. I mean, you pretty much know you’ve arrived when you become a hashtag, right?