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<\/p>\nThe win over Phoenix was the first piece of the foundation, as it was Toronto\u2019s first victory over an opponent with a winning record since the Raptors beat the Oklahoma City Thunder 103-101 on Jan. 25, a span of 19 games. The Detroit win improved the Raptors\u2019 record against the top 10 teams in the NBA to 4-19.<\/p>\n
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Ingram was asked if the two victories will quiet criticism of Toronto\u2019s performance against contenders.<\/p>\n
\u201cFor sure, but outside noise is outside noise, whatever opinion they have about us, that\u2019s cool,\u201d said Ingram. \u201cWe continue to fight, try to be the best we can on every single time that we play and live with the result.\u201d<\/p>\n
The back-to-back wins moved the Raptors (38-29) back up to sixth in the Eastern Conference standings after a few days sitting seventh, atop the play-in bracket. Beating the first-place Pistons on Sunday put Toronto 10 games back of Detroit but, more importantly, half a game ahead of the Miami Heat.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe really wanted to set the tone with our physicality, doesn\u2019t matter who the opponent is,\u201d said head coach Darko Rajakovic. \u201cI have utmost respect for Detroit, I think they\u2019re a championship-calibre team.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou\u2019ve got to set a tone, not to answer to what they do on the court.\u201d<\/p>\n
A major piece of Toronto\u2019s brief resurgence is that RJ Barrett of Mississauga, Ont., and Jakob Poeltl are both fully healthy again.<\/p>\n
Barrett had 27 points and six rebounds against the Pistons, while Poeltl and Scottie Barnes each had a double-double.<\/p>\n
Poeltl finished with 21 points and a season-high 18 rebounds, while Barnes added 14 points and pulled down 10 boards.<\/p>\n
\u201cBody felt really fresh. I don\u2019t know it\u2019s a long season, like sometimes you just wake up, you feel a little funky and other days you feel great,\u201d said Poeltl, who has missed 35 games this season with a sore lower back. \u201cIt\u2019s difficult to figure out why some days are just better than others.\u201d<\/p>\n
Barrett missed 15 games after he sprained his right knee in November. Rajakovic said now that Barrett\u2019s healthy he can get more involved defensively.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re preaching that to him there is no physical attribute that he does not have, that he\u2019s not capable of guarding one through four of anybody in the league,\u201d said Rajakovic. \u201cHe\u2019s just having that grit and mindset of doing it over and over and over again. <\/p>\n
\u201cHe showed us in moments that he is capable of doing it, but lately he\u2019s doing it in much longer, periods of time, and that\u2019s really helping the team to win.\u201d<\/p>\n
This report by The Canadian Press was first published March 15, 2026.<\/p>\n
John Chidley-Hill, The Canadian Press<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The win over Phoenix was the first piece of the foundation, as it was Toronto\u2019s first victory over…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":539232,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[194291],"tags":[879,49,48,2467,2461,2468,2460,2462,2463,44,2464,2465,2466,82,3302],"class_list":["post-539231","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-toronto","tag-breaking-news","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-central-vancouver-island","tag-nanaimo","tag-nanaimo-breaking-news","tag-nanaimo-news","tag-nanaimo-news-now","tag-nanaimonewsnow","tag-news","tag-oceanside","tag-parksville","tag-qualicum","tag-sports","tag-toronto"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/539231","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=539231"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/539231\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/539232"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=539231"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=539231"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=539231"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}