First impressions?
Gary Trent Jr. will have a better career with the Toronto Raptors than Gary Trent Sr., who back in 1998 — in one of those bizarre confluences of timing and numbers — was also traded from Portland to Toronto after 41 games of this third season with a career scoring average of about 10 points a game
But the elder Trent — a bruising post player who was perfectly built for rugged, no blood, no foul 1990s basketball — only lasted 13 games as a Raptor, although he went on to play 506 in the NBA over nine seasons.
Trent Jr. is equally suited for his era as a wing with some length whose specialty is stretching defences from deep and who is adept at switching to guard multiple positions on the perimeter. The Raptors are hoping to have him around for a while, given he’s only 22, and the team will be in a position to offer him a multi-year contract this coming summer.
He got the start against the Phoenix Suns, taking the departed Norman Powell’s place in the lineup alongside the Raptors’ other trade deadline ‘acquisition’ Kyle Lowry, who the Raptors didn’t trade.
That alone made Raptors head coach Nick Nurse’s day on Thursday.
“I found out probably like most of you guys about three o’clock when the thing shut down that he was still gonna be a Raptor,” said Nurse about finding out he’d have Lowry to coach until at least the end of the season after it was widely assumed the pending free agent would be dealt for parts and picks. “Listen, I’m happy about it. I still think that we’re in a season that’s been tumultuous at best, but we’re not out of it or anything like that and we continue to prove we can play pretty good basketball. Just hope we can string, I’m not saying a whole bunch of wins together because I just wanna string good play together and that takes care of itself, and hopefully we can get out of seemingly there’s some little road bump or pitfall or something ahead all the time since we got here. Hopefully we can get through that and get a chance to do that.”
Next impressions? Trent Jr. alone won’t save Toronto — he looked emotionally spent after a long week where he was at the centre of the NBA rumour mill, as he finished with eight points in 31 minutes. And Rodney Hood won’t either, although he hardly looked out of place, but he can’t do much to solve Toronto’s season-long struggles against teams with quality big men.
The Raptors lost 104-100 and although they can be encouraged by a fourth-quarter defensive effort where they held the high-flying Suns to 7-of-22 shooting, they still dropped their ninth game in the past 10 to fall to 18-27 as they try to scramble from 11th place into a playoff position.
Known as a shooter, Trent finished 4-of-11 from the floor and 0-of-5 from deep, including a miss on a potential go-ahead three in transition with 59 seconds left. But the career 40 per cent three-point shooter encouragingly had some of his best moments on defence, including forcing a miss from Suns veteran star Chris Paul in a one-on-one situation in the paint a couple of possessions prior to that.
The Raptors got to within two points with 2:11 to play after trailing by nine with 3:50 to play with a quick 7-0 run, but Toronto stalled at that point, counting only a lay-up by Fred VanVleet.
Pascal Siakam led the Raptors with 26 points, 11 rebounds and six assists but Toronto shot just 41.1 per cent from the floor for the game. The Suns got 19 points and eight rebounds from Paul while big man DeAndre Ayton had 19 points and nine rebounds and helped Phoenix to a 58-32 edge in points in the paint as they shot 48 per cent from the floor and help a 9-7 edge in offensive rebounds.
Wearing the same No. 33 that his father wore as a Raptor, Trent Jr. didn’t take long to show that he should acclimatize quickly. On his first touch he ran a simple pick-and-roll that ended up in a wide-open three for Siakam that went down. His first basket as a Raptor wasn’t a three but an elbow jumper on the move. Defensively he was as advertised: engaged and alert, though limited in that his only exposure to the Raptors systems and terminology came in a pre-game walkthrough.
“He’s coming into his own, little bit different style than Norman,” said Nurse before the game. “Kinda the shooting’s similar, the three-point shooting’s kinda similar percentage wise. Doesn’t maybe go to the rim maybe as explosive as Norman does, but not many do. And then we’re just gonna have to see how he fits in with the rest of it.
“You guys know what’s important to me and what’s important to making our team good is can he guard, and will he guard, and can he understand the schemes, and will he be a good chemistry piece, which, you know, that’s what we’re gonna start to find out.”
Playing the first three years of his career alongside one of the most prolific backcourt combinations in the NBA in Dame Lillard and CJ McCollum was good preparation for stepping into the lineup alongside Lowry and VanVleet.
“Coming from a two-guard set I know where to find my spots to score, know my role and [about] playing that to the best of my ability,” said Trent Jr. “I’m coming here to gel with everybody, to try to help get on the winning track and win as many games as possible and be a great teammate.”
Unfortunately, there’s not much that Trent Jr. can do about the Raptors’ biggest weakness which is finishing defensive possessions with a rebound and, too often of late, simply playing good defence at all.
The Raptors trailed 53-51 at the half but it was almost an illusion. The Suns shot 56 per cent from the floor and 41 per cent from three in part because the Raptors were struggling to make shots. Their 18-of-46 shooting meant the Suns were going the other way against scrambled Raptors defenders trying to get back in transition — the Suns were five-of-five on the break. The Suns also feasted on the Raptors’ lack of size. Ayton was 5-of-6 from the floor, facing no threat as he rolled comfortably down the lane to the rim, a big reason why the Suns enjoyed a 26-10 edge on points in the paint in the early going.
Siakam gave the Suns some matchup issues as well as he attacked Ayton and scored 17 points in the first half, but otherwise the only thing going for the Raptors was that they weren’t fouling — the Suns didn’t shoot a free throw in the first two quarters while Toronto was eight-of-eight. Toronto also benefitted from 10 Phoenix turnovers.
The Suns pushed their lead to 14 early in the third quarter as they opened the second half on a 20-6 run where they seemed to be able to access the Raptors’ paint untouched and get to the rim even more easily. The Raptors finally stiffened that point as they responded with a 16-6 run of their own to pull within four before the Suns took an 83-77 lead into the fourth quarter.
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