TORONTO — Toronto Raptors forward Patrick Patterson has a very particular routine prior to games at Air Canada Centre. As his team’s starters are about to be introduced, he stands directly under his basket, hanging onto the very bottom of the net with his index and middle fingers as he looks up at the scoreboard. Once the fireworks go off, and air buzzers sound, and the Drake anthem reaches full chorus, he grabs either side of the rim and completes a series of pull-ups, lifting his head through the hoop as the Raptors form a human tunnel for the starters to run through.
And then, after everyone’s had their name shouted at extreme decibels, and the crowd’s given its ovations, each one louder than the last, the Raptors huddle up in the paint and Patterson makes a speech. On Sunday afternoon, that speech seemed a bit longer, a bit more intense. It was about satisfaction.
“I had one question for everybody: Are we satisfied with what we’ve done individually and what we’ve done collectively as a team?” Patterson says. “With how far we’ve come, do we want more? Do we want to go even further? Do we want to make history? Do we want to keep playing or do we want to go home?”
Patrick Patterson and the Raptors aren’t going home. They’re going to Cleveland, for the Eastern Conference Final, which begins Tuesday night after the Raptors’ 116-89 throttling of the Miami Heat in Sunday’s afternoon’s Game 7.
Kyle Lowry and DeMar DeRozan are due a lot of credit for that fact, given that they combined for 63 points and shot 47 per cent between them, after struggling so torturously with their respective shots throughout these playoffs. But the Raptors’ role players, like the underappreciated Patterson, the inspirational catalyst Bismack Biyombo, and the dogged defender DeMarre Carroll, deserve just as much.
Without Patterson’s game-high seven offensive rebounds, and without Biyombo’s 41 minutes of tenacious paint skirmishing, and without Carroll’s deadly efficient 14 points on five shots, the Raptors aren’t celebrating like they were Sunday evening. They’re on the wrong side of all those questions Patterson asked of them before tip-off.
After the game, talking a mile a minute in front of his locker, Patterson rattled off another series of rapid-fire statements about his team. This time, it was the things they did well; and a list of reasons he thinks they won.
“We came out and we did the things we needed to do in order to get a win: dominating offensively and defensively; talking; communication on the defensive side of the ball; finishing plays with rebounds; establishing our all-stars on the offensive end,” Patterson said. “Collectively putting up a solid effort. Transitions, isolations, pick and rolls, every aspect of the game. Just performing well and carrying out the scouting report.”
That scouting report said the Heat would likely field an uber small lineup again, much like they did in Game 6 when the Raptors weren’t able to exploit their considerable size advantage against that highly effective Miami rotation. It had to be tempting for Raptors head coach Dwane Casey to match Miami’s small group with one of his own. But he stuck with Patterson and Biyombo for almost the entire game, trusting his role players to not let the Heat run rampant in the paint for a second consecutive game.
“It was something I knew that we were going to stick with. And I thought the 20 offensive rebounds were the story tonight,” Casey said. “We didn’t play big in our last game. I thought tonight we played big. If we’re going to do that, you’ve got to make sure you plant your feet in the lane and do what you do. And I thought Bismack and Patrick did that. They won that battle. Tonight, our big guys made them pay.”
Of course, those 20 team offensive rebounds Casey’s talking about (quietly, DeRozan and Lowry pulled down seven between them) were more than welcome, kept constant pressure on the Heat, and, most importantly, limited Miami’s opportunities with the ball. But before the game, Patterson and Biyombo — who contributed 13 collectively — had a discussion about grabbing 20 offensive boards on their own.
“That was the goal. To get 20 offensive rebounds between us. So, we did a terrible job,” Biyombo said with a laugh. “But without everybody that contributed to this win we would not have gotten it done. I’m just proud to see guys out there getting it done play after play.
“More than anything, this is home, man. This is home,” Biyombo continued. “We’ve got to protect home in front of our crowd. In a Game 7, even when you walk into the locker room, you can tell how focused everyone was. There was no doubt that we would get it done. It was just a matter of time for the game to start. Everybody was just anxious looking forward to the game.”
And then there’s Carroll. As he nears the end of a long, frustrating, wayward year of basketball, the 29-year-old with the classic Alabama drawl played one of his finest games as a Raptor.
It was an energetic, determined 33-minute night that saw Carroll primarily guarding Dwyane Wade, who had scored at least 20 points in each of his last four games. On this night, Carroll was able to hold him to 16, limiting the Miami star to just 13 shots and forcing him into a game-high four turnovers.
“You’re looking at a Hall of Fame player in Dwyane Wade. And I thought DeMarre did a commendable job on him. I thought he was really locked in,” Casey said. “To guard Dwyane Wade for as long as he did is very difficult to do. I think he’s one of the top one-on-one players in the league. He’s got power, he’s got strength — and DeMarre matched each move against him tonight.”
Carroll was also one of the most efficient Raptors offensively, scoring 14 points on just five shots, including a pair of three-pointers that took the air out of Miami rallies.
Playing on a recently-operated-upon knee, with a bum wrist, and who knows what else, Carroll was as untiring as ever on defence, doing everything he could to keep Wade, or whoever he was guarding, in front of him. And as it turns out, in between Games 6 and 7 of this series, Carroll sat down with Casey to talk about just that.
“We talked about a lot of things. A lot of schemes. I told coach, ‘look, at the end of the day, I’m a physical defender, and that’s how I want to play. If he beats me playing physical and gets me in foul trouble, that’s just how I’ve gotta play,’” said Carroll, who did pick up five fouls for his efforts Sunday afternoon. “So, I feel like that’s what I did tonight. I was being aggressive, man. I feel like I’ve got to be aggressive no matter what.”
His two all-star teammates, who will deservedly garner the majority of media attention going into this week’s Conference Finals against Cleveland, both said they took notice.
“DeMarre’s one of the toughest guys I’ve played with. He just brings that energy, that mindset. He pushed us. He’s steady pushing me and this guy every single day,” DeRozan said, motioning to Lowry beside him. “A lot of people look at us being the leaders of this team. But DeMarre’s definitely one of the leaders of the team as well. And he leads by example.”
And about that series with the Cavaliers — one the Raptors will enter as substantial underdogs due to a number of factors, none of them more glaring than the fact Toronto has played 14 games over the last month, and Cleveland just eight.
After reflecting on his pre-game speech about satisfaction, about how far they’d come, about craving more, and about not wanting to go home, Patterson took a moment to look forward. There was already a hundred-plus page scouting report for the upcoming series sitting in his locker. And he showed he’s already been looking through it, as he started rattling off a third and final list — one about what’s to come.
“The Cavs, they’re a tough matchup from every position. Of course you’ve got LeBron, we don’t really need to talk about him. Kyrie’s been playing so exceptionally well throughout these playoffs. K Love, what he’s able to do. Tristan Thompson, an offensive rebounding machine. J.R. Smith, who’s knocking down full-court threes,” Patterson said. “Man, even their bench is playing exceptionally well. And they’re playing great defence. So, it’s a challenge from every aspect, from every area of the game. We have to play our A-game — every single night.”
The Raptors role players did just that Sunday afternoon. And that’s a start.