The tough schedule to start the season will now begin to balance out for the Raptors and Colangelo is hoping to see smoother sailing ahead.
“As the schedule starts to turn, as we get healthy, we should be looking at a fairly successful run here but we’ve got to take care of business, as they say, one game at a time — I know it sounds cliché but it’s very true,” he said.
The Raptors have now won seven of their last eight games, a run which Colangelo believes has been aided by better defensive focus.
“We’ve gone back to some of the things that we were doing consistently last year,” he said. “I think overall it’s the effort and the focus and the attention to detail and it’s the coaches not accepting anything but a better performance.”
The absence of the big men has also forced the team to play with a smaller lineup as small forwards Mickael Pietrus and Alan Anderson have both shifted to power forward at times. It has proven successful but Colangelo warned that it may not always pay off.
“We’re playing a lot of small ball to be effective and it’s worked thus far, but teams will adjust. They will scout us and we will need to probably make further adjustments.”
