Raptors Film Room: What comes next for them after NBA Cup loss to Knicks?
The Raptors slump continued in a blowout loss to the New York Knicks in their NBA Cup Quarter Finals game on Tuesday. Jakob Poeltl was hunted out once again and the Knicks firepower kept them humming all game. The Raptors also put up their worst offensive performance of the season without RJ Barrett or Immanuel Quickley.
They now have two games in the next 10 days. Can they come back from this rejuvenated?
Samson Folk recapped the rest of the game:
“The start of the game is gonna be very important. A lot of times, it starts with us taking care of the ball.” Coach Darko said of the Raptors recent slow starts. Early turnovers, being loose with the ball, traveling, illegal screens, whatever it might be, it takes some momentum from us. So, we gotta be sharp from the jump tonight and we can’t allow the same (kind of) start.”
The first possession of the game? A turnover by Brandon Ingram. It was up to the Raptors to make that either a blip or an omen. They chose blip, at least for the first quarter. The Raptors scored the hell out of the basketball to the tune of 39 points. It’s not as if the Knicks were a highly ranked defense coming into this game, and their lack of resistance allowed the Raptors to get back to a faster paced style, with lots of looks in transition, and a huge boost in the halfcourt by a transcendent 17 points on 7 shots from Ingram over his first 12 minutes of play. He would’ve been the defining player of the opening frame if it weren’t for Jalen Brunson’s eruption on the other end, for 20 points.
Two teams drifting in the wake of star scoring and trying to support in whatever manner they could manage. Neither defense managing to much in the way of stopping singular players, let alone teamwide offense. The Raptors won the first trade of blows by 4 points, going up 39-35.
The shot making wasn’t present to start the second quarter, unfortunately. With Ingram off the floor, the Raptors scored 2 points in their first 5 minutes of play. It’s not as if the Knicks were lighting it up offensively either, with Brunson off the floor as well, but they were at least passable.
Once the Knicks sorted out how they wanted to guard the Raptors — changing where they loaded up — they were able to dull a lot of the sharpness in the Raptors offensive process. It’s been a sticking point of the offense and it’s general lack of ability to create consistent, dependable looks. They can definitely create some, but players have no expectation of where their shots might come from or how many. It might only be Ingram who has an idea of how often and where he’s going to get looks and it’s, of course, because he’s dribbling to his spots by himself. It’s hard to achieve flow and consistency throughout the roster this way. It’s why the Raptors efficiency lived and died with Ingram, or with transition, in the opening run.
They got absolutely dominated in the second quarter. The Knicks offense is top 3 in the NBA, and the Raptors offense has been in a free fall, so I suppose it made sense that they lost the thread. The disparity in shot quality was staggering between the two teams. A 34-13 slam down in the second quarter, and a 17 point deficit heading into halftime.
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