TORONTO — If the Toronto Raptors are going to win a basketball game at Air Canada Centre Wednesday night, and regain control of a first-round series that didn’t look like it would make it to this point last time they were on that floor, they’re going to need a few things.
For starters, a dominant game from DeMar DeRozan or Kyle Lowry — preferably both. Also, better contributions from a bench unit that came into the playoffs as the NBA’s best but has played as anything but since. And, sure, a return to the efficient, ball-moving, high-percentage-shot-creating style of play the Raptors spent an entire year instituting would be nice, too.
But what about Serge Ibaka? He’s played the most minutes in this series of any Raptor not named Kyle or DeMar, and the quality of that play has been all over the place. He followed up strong performances in the first two games with lacklustre ones in the next two. And, so far, as Ibaka has gone, so has the series.
Ibaka was arguably Toronto’s best player in its series-opening victory (feels like a long time ago, doesn’t it?) when he put up 23 points with 12 rebounds, shooting 8-of-11 from the field. He was active, his was involved, and, in a game where Toronto turned the ball over 18 times, Ibaka was responsible for only one of them, which says something considering how much the ball was in his hands.
Game 2 was a slight step back from a production standpoint, but the Raptors won by double digits and Ibaka finished a game-high plus-32. He didn’t shoot as well as he did in Game 1, but he still grabbed nine rebounds, blocked three shots, and, as Toronto again struggled with turnovers, Ibaka didn’t cough the ball up once.
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But the last two games, a pair of losses in Washington, have been a different story. Ibaka combined for only nine attempts (hitting three) over the two games after putting up 11 in each of the prior two. He still found his way to rebounds, and contributed a pair of blocks in Game 4. But his turnovers spiked dramatically, as he committed seven over the two games, several of them bizarrely clumsy and under little to no pressure.
In Game 3, he travelled in the paint, and lost the ball twice in one-on-one post-ups. In Game 4, he travelled in the paint again, dropped a ball out of bounds on a two-on-one fast break, and threw a pair of bad passes that were picked off, one directly under his own basket that led to a Kelly Oubre dunk, and another with the game tied and 3:30 remaining that preceded a John Wall to Markieff Morris lob at the other end.
That last one was particularly backbreaking considering it came at such a critical juncture of the game and the intended recipient of the pass, Lowry, was wide open for a three-pointer. Make a better pass in that spot, and the rest of the night could have played out much differently.
Of course, it’s not just him. The turnovers are a team-wide epidemic and the Raptors currently have the worst turnover rate of any playoff team at 16.7 per cent. But, over the last two games, Ibaka’s been a big part of it.
“We’re making some very uncharacteristic passes,” Casey said. “No disrespect to Washington, but it has nothing to do with their defence. Nothing. The guy was clearly open, and we threw it another direction. Those things are uncharacteristic. We clean up half of those and that will help us tremendously.”
The dramatic reduction in Ibaka’s attempts — from 22 in Games 1 and 2, to nine in Games 3 and 4 — is also curious. He’s had only eight nights this season with five or fewer attempts, and a quarter of them have come in the last two games.
It gets at another team-wide issue — hesitation. In going over film from the two games in Washington, Casey found a number of situations in which shooters like Ibaka had good looks at the basket — particularly from three-point range — and, sometimes inexplicably, turned them down.
“He’s got to take the shots that are coming to him,” Casey said. “A lot of our perimeter players had open looks. And for whatever reason pump-faked themselves out of shots. They’ve got to be shot ready.
“I think that’s where the difference was in Games 1 and 2, and Games 3 and 4 — [Ibaka] was shot ready. He had it locked and ready to go. I think that will help him more than anything on the offensive end.”
Ibaka had a rough go of it defensively in Washington, as well. In Game 3, Mike Scott scored eight of his 12 points while matched up against Ibaka, including a pair of threes. Of the six field goals attempted with Ibaka as the primary defender that night, only one was classified as contested by NBA.com.
Two nights later, only four of the 13 field goals attempted against Ibaka went down as contested, and none of the four three-point attempts. Meanwhile, the Wizards were able to get Ibaka switched onto Wall nine times, and the Wizards guard made the most of it, scoring seven points in those matchups and drawing a pair of fouls.
Of course, the ultra-quick Wall is an exceptionally challenging cover for anyone, so asking a big, even a mobile one like Ibaka, to lock him down consistently in those scenarios is probably asking a bit much. But Casey says Ibaka has “got to be” tighter defensively if the Raptors are going to be successful — and that he doesn’t doubt the 28-year-old will be.
“He’s got to be more involved. When he gets on a switch, he’s got to do what he does best — guarding one-on-one. He’s got to do a better job in that,” Casey said. “He had a rough couple games defensively and I think he’ll bounce out of it. I know he will because he’s one of the premier defenders, shot blockers in the league. I have all the confidence in the world he’s going to do that.”
We’ll see. In Game 4, the Raptors were clearly trying to get Ibaka going early. He was the last Raptor to touch the ball on each of Toronto’s first three possessions, resulting in a made three-pointer (thanks to fortuitous bounces off the rim and backboard), a bricked floater from the paint, and a turnover.
Toronto could opt to feed him early again on Wednesday, looking to kickstart his production, or back off and let him ease into things. Either way, the Raptors are going to need more from Ibaka than they got in Washington. And, if the first four games of this series are any indication, just how much they get could tell you a lot about how things are going to end up.
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