Kyle Lowry doesn’t do nostalgia. At least on demand.
Then again, when does the cantankerous Toronto Raptors point guard do anything that isn’t his idea and on his timetable?
So, it’s no surprise that as Lowry and the Raptors had their first opportunity to turn their attention to the most glorious moment in their history — both individually and organizationally — the franchise cornerstone wasn’t quite ready to acknowledge it.
You might think Toronto’s first engagement with the Golden State Warriors since — does it even need to be said? — deserved something other than the ‘just another game’ routine.
Lowry? Nah. Not yet.
Sure, every Raptors fan can recite the hits from last season’s championship run on demand, and do regularly, but Lowry’s been there and has the parade photos. When I asked him if it would be weird when the Raptors charter touched down in San Francisco for the first time since they arrived for Game 6 of the NBA Finals, Lowry wouldn’t play.
“We always land in San Fran,” he said, with a hint of mischief. “I really haven’t even thought about it like that, honestly. But we always land in San Fran, just so you know. So it won’t be weird.”
Whatever, Kyle.
If you want to suggest that playing the Warriors for the first time since you had the greatest moment of your career, when you sprinted from the gates in a pressure-packed elimination game and put up 11 straight points before play-by-play man Mike Breen could catch his breath, infusing your team, the city of Toronto and an entire country with the belief that a championship would be won is no big deal, go right ahead.
No one believes you. And plus, they don’t care. Any excuse to relive the Raptors’ title run is a good excuse.
Now, a lot has changed since that stunning burst that opened the Raptors scoring in Game 6 and was a precursor to a signature 26-point, 10-assist and seven-rebound night.
The venue, for instance. The Raptors’ championship win was the last NBA game ever played at Oracle Arena across the bay in Oakland. The Warriors have moved into plush new digs in San Francisco proper — Chase Center.
And the 2019-20 Warriors aren’t quite the 73-9 Warriors of 2015-16 or even the injury-plagued group that couldn’t hold back the Raptors tide last June. Kevin Durant is a Brooklyn Net, though he has yet to take the floor for his new team this season after tearing his Achilles tendon in Game 5 in Toronto. Klay Thompson will have missed this entire season after tearing his ACL in the second half of Game 6.
Steph Curry has played only four games for Golden State this year after breaking his hand on Oct. 30, effectively ending any realistic hopes the Warriors would even make the playoffs.
In one of those odd coincidences, Curry is set to return to the lineup on Thursday night against Toronto.
“Well, I think it’s gonna be great to go to their new arena,” said Raptors head coach Nick Nurse said. “Rumour has it that Curry’s gonna make his debut, or whatever it is, re-debut.
“I would imagine they will be energized and the place will be excited and I hope we can get some rest and figure out a defence to stop him.”
Funny Nurse should mention that. The Raptors — who have dealt with their own share of injuries this season — are hopeful to have Fred VanVleet (shoulder) back in the lineup. Also hopeful to return is Serge Ibaka (knee), although Marc Gasol (hamstring) remains doubtful.
It was VanVleet’s tenacious defence on Curry — he was the ‘one’ in the famous ‘box-and-one’ defensive alignment Nurse broke out in Game 4 — that helped turn the series.
Curry shot just 41.7 per cent from the floor and 34.3 per cent from three over six games and VanVleet’s defence — along with his own red-hot shooting, which included his closing 12-point volley in the fourth quarter of Game 6 — was a big reason none other than the venerable broadcaster Hubie Brown recognized VanVleet with a Finals MVP vote.
All the line-up changes have left the 2019-20 Warriors in a strange holding pattern after appearing in five straight Finals and winning three championships in five years.
This year’s version is 14-48, the worst record in the NBA.
But there is optimism, too. Not only will the Warriors likely have a top-three draft pick to use this summer, they picked up another potentially high pick for 2021 when they dealt DeAngelo Russell — who they acquired from the Nets in the sign-and-trade deal for Durant — to the Minnesota Timberwolves. The picks should be fodder to either trade their way into more talent to resume what they hope remains a long contending window or to draft cheaper young talent for the same purpose.
Oh, and who else did the Warriors get for Russell?
How about former No. 1-overall pick Andrew Wiggins, perhaps the most scrutinized NBA prospect Canada has ever produced.
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The Warriors were excited about getting a head start integrating Wiggins into their winning ways after six years in Minnesota, perhaps the most chronically inept franchise not playing out of Madison Square Garden.
So far so good. Through nine games Wiggins is averaging 20.1 points and 3.8 assists a game while shooting a promising 46.5 per cent from the floor.
While the Warriors may not be the team Lowry pretends not to think about, having tumbled or at least taken a competitive pause this year, the Raptors have managed to keep their championship aspirations front and centre.
The idea that their title was the product of “Kawhi and the back-up singers,” as VanVleet put it during the playoffs last season, has proven a myth.
The Raptors are in second place in the East, trailing only the Milwaukee Bucks, a regular-season juggernaut not far off the 73-win Warriors. League-wide they are just 4.5 games behind LeBron James and the Los Angeles Lakers, and are one game up on the Los Angeles Clippers, where Leonard skipped off to in order to build his own superteam.
And yet, Lowry claims he only looks forward, not back.
“It was awesome. But we’re on to a new season,” he said. “It’s always about the next game, next season, right now. We’re working on something right now and continue to try to build toward something that we did previously.”
But the present has been informed by the past. The championship the Raptors celebrated here last June — and no one more passionately than Lowry — resonates through every fibre of the team that will take the floor Thursday night.
Not everyone is a stubborn as Lowry about it.
“Yeah, you think about that,” said Raptors forward Pascal Siakam, whose breakout, All-Star season was launched on the platform provided by the Raptors title run. “Because you don’t really realize what you did until sometimes you sit back and think about it.
“It’s incredible what we did and I think most of the time when things aren’t going well you can think back: We did that and we’re capable, we have the people do it [again].”
And that, I’m willing to bet, is a premise Lowry would agree with, whether he’d acknowledge it or not.
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