The Oklahoma City Thunder came out for warm-ups at their appointed time, about 20 minutes before Wednesday night’s tip-off against the Toronto Raptors at the Air Canada Centre.
Or at least some of them did. You kept waiting for the rest of the team – you know, the one with superstars Kevin Durant and Russell Westbrook on it – to join the line.
And then you realized that was it -– a very men’s league-looking gaggle of eight guys, missing not only their injured marquee attractions, out with foot and hand fractures, respectively, but five more teammates variously incapacitated.
“Thank goodness it’s only a five-on-five game,” said Thunder head coach Scott Brooks, sounding like he’d rather just postpone the whole thing.
Well, little did Brooks know.
By midway through the third quarter of what ended up being a 100-88 win for Toronto, Brooks was down to seven guys, as Perry Jones left the game with a bruised knee. And a little after that Thunder guard Reggie Jackson -– already shying away from taking shots after apparently hurting his hand earlier in the quarter –- took an intentional foul to stop play so he could leave the floor after suffering a charley horse although he did return for the fourth quarter.
Coaches being coaches, before the game Raptors’ Dwane Casey was trying to turn what should have been as close as a night off as you can get in the NBA -– adding to the OKC woes was that Toronto was the second game of a back-to-back and the end of a five-game, 10,000 km tour to start their season -– into some kind of dangerous trap.
“It’s a nightmare,” said Casey before the game, ignoring the raised eyebrows in the audience. “Guys are looking at eight guys, they don’t know half of them, but they’re dangerous. It’s a wounded animal.”
Brooks, when told of Casey’s comment: “I’m sure he’d be thinking it would be a bigger nightmare if our entire roster was here.”
Instead Brooks has been getting used to the NBA’s defending MVP sitting in on coach’s meetings and waving towels on the bench, where he’ll likely be until mid-December, most are projecting.
“KD is an amazing player and teammate (but) I’m tired of having him in my huddle,” said Brooks, whose team dropped to 1-4 on the season. “He’s trying to tell me what plays to run all the time.
“He’s a great cheerleader; he’s probably one of the great cheerleaders of all time.”
There is no doubt the 18,800 at the ACC would have liked to see Durant playing, rather than encouraging his undermanned teammates. Under the Raptors’ demand-based ticketing policy, fans paid premium prices in anticipation of seeing one of the NBA’s elite lineups, likely remembering the double-overtime thriller the two clubs played here last March where Durant capped off a 51-point night with a walk-off three.
“That was a great game,” recalled Brooks, his mood momentarily lightened.
Through the first 24 minutes, it was Casey who was more prophetic.
The Thunder signaled their intentions early: They were going to drop back into a zone to save energy and foul and force the Raptors to score from the perimeter.
They took a defensive three-second call on the Raptors’ first possession and barely moved afterwards.
Typically NBA teams play zone only in spurts and the steady diet of it served its purpose, as the Raptors looked confused with James Johnson quick-shooting threes and over-penetrating at times, and on one occasion Kyle Lowry posting up and pitching out to Jonas Valanciunas for jumpers, which is pretty much the opposite of how it’s supposed to be.
“I think the zone psyched us out,” said Casey later.
But more worrisome, the Raptors were badly exposed defensively. In theory it’s supposed to be their calling card and something that should benefit from the Raptors returning eight of their 10 rotation players, but so far they haven’t shown the commitment.
The Raptors entered the game allowing opponents to shoot 48.1 percent from the floor (26th in the NBA) and 43.9 percent from deep, tied for 30th.
“We haven’t found our personality yet,” said Casey. “It’s only been three games, but we can’t wait for 15 games for that.”
Well now it’s been four games, and still no sign of the kind of tenacious defensive effort that will be required to make any kind of playoff impact come April and May.
In the early going, the Raptors allowed the Thunder’s one healthy all-star, Serge Ibaka, to shoot 6-of-8 from the field on his way to 14 first-half points. OKC shot 60.6 percent from the floor in the half, compared to 40.5 by Toronto.
That the Raptors were able to cut a 10-point, second-quarter deficit to 52-51 at half was a tribute to the Raptors getting a half-dozen offensive rebounds compared to none for OKC, who were in full energy conservation mode and retreating into their defensive shell after every shot attempt.
The Raptors didn’t emerge unscathed. Already without Amir Johnson (having tweaked his ankle on Saturday against Orlando; Casey said he’d miss Wednesday night’s game in Boston as well), Valanciunas was unavailable for the second half after getting whacked in the nose by Sebastian Telfair’s off-hand. He was x-rayed for a possible broken nose.
Still, the Raptors were in no position to complain.
It was somewhat inevitable that the Raptors would eventually seize control of the game. They entered the fourth quarter leading 73-70 and opened the fourth quarter on a 7-0 run to push the lead to 10. Eventually it was Lou Williams’s nine fourth quarter points, fuelled by a pair of steals, that pushed the game out of reach.
So the Raptors got their win, but hollow seems to be the right adjective.
Four-game sample sizes are nothing to panic over but the Raptors’ 3-1 start has its share of holes in it, with their defensive effort primary among them.
The Thunder arrived with one legitimate scoring threat in Ibaka, and he was able to have his way, finishing with 25 points on 11-of-14 shooting. As a group the Thunder, minus their two superstars and with six other players unavailable due to injury, were shooting a robust 56 percent with four minutes left to play when the game was still within reach and finished at 52.3 percent.
As a result, the Raptors can enjoy their 3-1 record only so much.
“It’s the ugliest win I’ve ever had in Toronto, but we’ll take it,” said Greivis Vasquez, before heading to the airport where the Raptors will play Boston Wednesday to finish a stretch of four games in five nights in four cities. “I will say we’re pissed at ourselves … we have to do a better job, collectively, defensively.”
On Tuesday night at home, they played down to their weakened opponent’s level, and have yet to find their own.