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TORONTO – The Toronto Raptors have won a few games easily over their monthly heater, but on Sunday night they won by defying the game’s top power.
How good are the Raptors going right now?
They messed with a line, and it didn’t come back to haunt them.
Seventh straight win and gunning for their 11thth In their last 12, the Raptors voluntarily sat center Jacob Poeltl (back injury management), changing their starting lineup for the first time since their Nov. 8 road loss at Philadelphia.
They ran away with it as they defeated the visiting Brooklyn Nets 119-109 in a game that was within two possessions for almost the entire second half. The Raptors put on their surgical gowns for the final four minutes, got clinical and won, tying the game after the Nets went on a 15-5 run.
They also had the opportunity to get another big bench boost, in large part from a new source. This time, it was second-year wing Ja’Kobe Walter doing his best Jamison Battle impression — the Raptors’ hot run began when the little-used shooter hit six threes on six attempts in the second half against Cleveland in October.
He hit a pair two minutes late in the third quarter to cap a dunk off a feed from Grady Dick (12 points, three assists, two steals) that started a night that kept Nate Surge at bay when the Raptors were short-handed and not in top form. Already missing Poeltl, the Raptors lost starting wing RJ Barrett — who had 16 points on four-of-eight shooting, with two steals — in the third quarter when he sprained his right knee on an uncontested dunk. The remaining starters — Scotty Barnes, Brandon Ingram and Emmanuel Coakley — started the fourth quarter shooting a combined nine-of-32.
Somehow the Raptors led 87-82, but it felt like it.
It only got tighter when Tyrese Martin — who finished with a team-leading 26 points, including five threes — left the game with 9:15 left. The Nets could never take the lead, but trailed by no more than two over the next five minutes.
But the balance went awry when Coakley returned to the floor — he was sitting with five fouls — and shared the backcourt with Jamal Shead, Barnes, Ingram and Sandro Mamoklashvili, who started in Poultle’s place.
After a pair of shad free throws, the second-year guard engineered a quick catch-and-shoot three for Quickley on the first possession when he checked in to put the Raptors up by five. On the next possession, the ball went to Ingram (14 points, six rebounds, four assists and two steals) in the mid-post, and when the double-team came it was a cross-court pass to find Coley for another open three.
Suddenly the game wasn’t so close.
“Those last four minutes, it’s time to win,” said Coakley (13 points, four assists), adding that it was no coincidence that Ingram was able to find him open on a triple that put the Raptors up by eight with 2:22 to play. “When I played in New York, Julius (Randall, now with the Timberwolves) used to get a lot of doubles, so I kind of got a sense of where the soft spots were on double teams and things like that, but also, we work on that.
“Me and BI spent some time (Saturday) when he’s doubling up and where he wants me in and where I feel comfortable.”
Quickley finished the game making three of six threes after starting the game. Quickley is now shooting 43.8 percent from three since the Raptors started rolling, impressive given he started the season shooting 2-18.
Another resurgent Raptor is Walter, who has struggled — like many of the team’s younger players — to get comfortable playing a more varied dose of minutes in a deeper and healthier rotation than he did in his rookie season.
After pressing aggressively, he settles into a groove. He has made eight of his last 10 threes to drag his overall percentage to 43.8 percent, after it had been hovering below 30 percent for a long stretch.
“It’s always a good day when you’re making shots,” Walter said. “It just comes with confidence and trust in your work.”
It is more than that. Part of the challenge of getting on the floor as a young player when you’re shooting poorly is not letting missed shots bleed into other parts of the game. Walter’s game started to take off when he got more minutes than usual last Wednesday against Philadelphia. That night, coach Darko Rajkovic credited him for his defensive presence against the Sixers’ young guards.
“Well, back to work,” Rajkovic said after Sunday’s win. “He put in a lot of work during the summer and preseason, and he’s a guy that usually on a weekly basis, he’s one of the guys that takes the most shots in our gym.
“So, he’s really committed to developing that part of his game. And him looking confident out there and taking good shots, not forcing anything … was really helpful. For a young player who wants to prove himself, taking good shots is very important. I thought he did a really good job tonight.”
He had plenty of company. Walter was one of eight Raptors to score in double figures. Barnes overcame a slow start to finish with 17 points, seven rebounds, four assists, two steals and four blocked shots. He received key defensive responsibilities over Nets’ leading scorer Michael Porter Jr. Shead had nine assists off the bench. Mamukelashvili had 12 points, including his own big late three in his first start as a Raptor and his first win since the end of the 2023-24 season.
The Raptors needed it to overcome Poeltl’s planned absence and Barrett’s injury. They will try to extend their longest winning streak to four years on Monday night against visiting Cleveland (Sportsnet, 7 pm ET / 4 pm PT).
Barrett will have more medical imaging on Monday.
Meanwhile, Poultle decided to hold the Raptors to three games in four nights, including this back-to-back. The Raptors elected to hold Poultle out to avoid straining his back, which kept him out for four games earlier this season and saw him struggle in a few other starts.
“For now. That’s the situation,” Rajkovic said when asked if Pouillet would automatically drop out of the one-and-a-half back seats. “… We’re evaluating where he’s at after every game and every week. As he develops, I can see him playing back to back without a problem.”
Poeltl’s return to health after a slow start coincided with the Raptors playing their best basketball
“He helps us in a lot of ways that you can see in the box score. But there’s a lot of things that he’s doing that you can’t see on paper … but it’s an opportunity for other people to step up and help us tonight,” Rajkovic said before the game.
In the past two days, Rajkovic has added wellness guru to his head coaching title, stressing the importance of adequate sleep in health and recovery.
He sounded like a podcaster on Friday, saying: “If somebody offered you a pill that could help you recover your brain, that could help you increase your energy, that could help you with processing, reaction time and all of that, would you take that pill? It’s 100 percent proven and healthy. Would you take that pill? Would you take two? It’s a pill and I think it’s very important not to sleep and “Sleep is very important.”
He doubled down on that at practice on Saturday, noting that one of the challenges of the NBA schedule is finding adequate rest. But does he follow his advice? A noted coffee aficionado, he usually has an espresso at 6 p.m., 90 minutes before most weeknight games — not ideal.
And then there’s Ingram, who sleeps four hours on game days as part of his routine. Sleeping is not his problem.
“Y’all see how he looks at halftime? Said Shade of his veteran teammate. “He’s literally always asleep until he puts the ball in the basket … He’s really good at basketball.”
The Raptors have forced the singer to fall silent at the start of the Canadian anthem to encourage the crowd at Scotiabank Arena to cheer — something that may have happened in the playoffs in years past, but not as usual during the regular season. It’s picked up the pace play by play, as the crowd is going to do a decent job of singing as a choir.
A few raptors are joining in recently – shad, in particular. The Raptors guard sang along while wearing a microphone for SportsNet on Friday’s broadcast, cheering on his teammates.
“I’ve always sung the anthem, even in college, and so, to be here, to learn, to learn something new, I think it’s great,” he said. “Like, it’s basically the complete opposite of the American anthem. So, it’s good to know both, and then, you know, I’m basically half-Canadian, so I get to show my Canadian side.”
