Broadcast Schedule<\/a><\/p>\nAnd while the Blazers came out smoking, hitting six of their first nine three-point attempts, including four in five minutes by Toumani Camara, to open an early lead, Immanuel Quickley kept pace by scoring 12 of his 22 points and making two of his five threes in the first quarter. He added eight assists, helping the Raptors’ offence keep turning over at moments when it looked like it might stall.\u00a0<\/p>\n
But it was some of the secondary sources of fuel that allowed the Raptors to keep just enough distance that the Blazers couldn\u2019t come all the way back.\u00a0<\/p>\n
After a relatively unproductive weekend, Shead was back to his game-changing self, accounting for six of the Blazers’ 14 turnovers with five steals and a crucial drawn charge on Avdija with 38.8 seconds left as the game\u2019s frantic end reached its fever pitch. He shot just 1-of-8 from the floor, but added five assists in his 23 minutes, and changed the tone of the game.<\/p>\n
\u201cHis energy in the first half, he really got us going,\u201d said Rajakovic. \u201cIn the first half, he had a slow start there, they caught fire, they were shooting the ball really well. And when Jamal came in the game, it really gave us energy and a couple of steals that he had started us off.\u201d<\/p>\n
And Gradey Dick, who has leaned into sharpening up his defensive shortcomings but in the meantime has struggled to do what he does best \u2014 shoot \u2014 for one night showed how impactful he can be when he brings all of that to the floor.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The third-year wing finished with 14 points on 6-of-8 shooting but earned nearly 18 minutes in part because of his defence. His best offensive sequence came in the fourth quarter when he hit a tough pull-up jumper and then a transition three \u2014 he was 7-of-37 from deep over 12 games and three quarters at that point \u2014 that put the Raptors up by 14 with just over 10 minutes to play.\u00a0<\/p>\n
It would have been nice if the Raptors could have coasted home from that point, but a trio of Blazers threes shrunk that advantage, forcing them to dig in again.\u00a0<\/p>\n
But Toronto did. And in the space of one night, made a two-game mini slump, and the prospect of something bigger looming, into a passing cloud that barely merited an umbrella, rather than the kind of storm that can cause serious damage.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u2022 Getting Sharpe: Shaedon\u00a0Sharpe arrived in Toronto after a five-hour flight and went to the gym. It\u2019s become a routine on the road for the fourth-year Canadian guard. <\/p>\n
\u201cI try and get in the gym (the night) before the game, work on my shot and kind of what I see from another team and just work on the shots I’m shooting during the game,\u201d said Sharpe, who went 9-of-18 from the floor on Tuesday. <\/p>\n
So far, it\u2019s been his attacks on the rim that have generated the best results for Sharpe, who was picked seventh overall in 2022 without having played college basketball and \u2014 because of the pandemic \u2014 very little high school hoops either. But his game has continued to evolve. He arrived in Toronto averaging a career-high 20.9 points, 4.8 rebounds and 2.0 assists and 1.3 steals (another career-best) even while his minutes have dropped to 27.7 per game on a deeper Trail Blazers team, compared with 31.9 minutes the past two seasons. Using his elite athleticism to get to the rim has been a focus, and generating more fouls has been a by-product. He\u2019s getting to the line 6.7 times per 36 minutes, more than double the 3.3\/per 36 he\u2019s averaged for his career. <\/p>\n
It\u2019s a nice uptick for a 78 per cent free-throw shooter. <\/p>\n
\u201cI think it’s just me being aggressive,\u201d he said. \u201cLearning more about the game and what teams are trying to force you into. So for me, I’m just trying to be aggressive. And I know when I started doing that, defences start collapsing, and then that’s when I’ll kick out to my teammates. Or get fouled. I’m trying to just be aggressive and force the refs to make a call.\u201d <\/p>\n
Sharpe hopes to be in the Canadian national team mix for the upcoming Olympic quadrennial, and added “I think getting to line is one of your best bets.\u201d <\/p>\n
His drives are as fun as anything in the NBA, given there is always the chance he\u2019ll punch one through the rim and bring the house down. He had two dunks in the first half, and another \u2014 the most spectacular, an effortless windmill \u2014 was negated when Immanuel Quickley picked up an offensive foul trying to get over the screen Sharpe used to free him up. He\u2019s confident his work on his shooting will pay off soon enough, too. Sharpe is shooting just 25.2 per cent from deep and only 32.3 per cent for his career. It\u2019s the missing piece that would perfectly complement his ability to attack the paint, often spectacularly. But his shooting will unlock the rest of his game, and he\u2019s confident it\u2019s coming. <\/p>\n
\u201cI mean, we played 20 games so far,\u201d said Sharpe, who has appeared in 17 after missing three with a calf strain. \u201cSo, we got a whole bunch more left. Feel like, you know, that’s just gonna even itself out, and just gotta keep shooting and just being confident. And I think that number starts creeping up.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u2022 Waiting for RJ Barrett<\/a>:\u00a0When the starting guard left the Raptors win against the Washington Wizards a week ago Sunday with a sprained knee, there was initial cause for concern, given he tweaked his knee taking off on an uncontested fastbreak dunk. But initial reports were positive, with no structural damage turning up on subsequent medical imaging. <\/p>\nHowever, it appears that Barrett might be out a little longer than those first optimistic reports indicated.\u00a0\u201cRJ is improving,\u201d said Rajakovic. \u201cHe\u2019s still not taking any participation in team activities. He\u2019s recovering and improving.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
If Barrett doesn\u2019t return to practice this week, his availability for the NBA Cup quarterfinals on Dec. 9th against his former New York Knicks\u00a0could be in question, given he would likely require three to five days of live workouts before being declared game-ready. Something to monitor given that prior to Tuesday night, Toronto\u2019s offensive rating in the four games Barrett had missed was 102.7, or last in the NBA. On the season, the Raptors’ offensive rating is 116.1. \u201cHe\u2019s a big part of what we do,\u201d said Rajakovic. \u201cHe\u2019s elite in transition. He\u2019s elite in creating his own shot. He\u2019s also a playmaker. He\u2019s averaging 20 points a game. Definitely, you\u2019re going to feel that.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u2022 Hard-won experience: With Barrett out, second-year wing Ja\u2019Kobe Walter has moved into the starting lineup and taken over some of the most difficult defensive assignments the Raptors face. He\u2019s more than held his own.\u00a0\u201cI thought that Ja\u2019Kobe did a really good job against Donovan Mitchell, guarding him. That was his matchup. The other night in New York, he guarded Brunson as a primary matchup,” Rajakovic said. “Brunson was good in that game, but he was still shooting 6-for-19 from the field. Any opportunity a player who is 20 years old gets to play against those types of players, it\u2019s an amazing learning opportunity. What Ja\u2019Kobe is doing really good after each of those games is he goes back, he\u2019s analyzing, he\u2019s watching film with coaches as well and trying to figure out what the areas are, how to figure out those players and how to be even better next time.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"TORONTO \u2014 Never to worry.\u00a0 Lose two straight with some tough opponents coming up? Not a problem.\u00a0 The…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":322137,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[434],"tags":[49,48,459,82],"class_list":{"0":"post-322136","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nba","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-nba","11":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/322136","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=322136"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/322136\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/322137"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=322136"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=322136"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=322136"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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