The Portland Trail Blazers are facing off against the Toronto Raptors on the road to kick off a long five-game road trip. With losses in two straight games to the San Antonio Spurs and Oklahoma City Thunder, the Blazers are looking to rebound with a win.
However, the Raptors have been one of the NBA’s surprise teams this season. Despite being on a two-game losing streak to the Charlotte Hornets and New York Knicks, Toronto is sitting fourth in the Eastern Conference through a fourth of the season. That success has largely come from the duo of Brandon Ingram and Scottie Barnes. The two are averaging 21.5 and 19.9 points per game, respectively, so far this season and have spearheaded a well-rounded Raptors team.
Portland Trail Blazers (8-12) at Toronto Raptors (14-7) – Tues. Dec 2nd – 4:30pm Pacific
How to watch via antenna or cable: See your options on the Rip City Television Network.
How to watch via streaming: BlazerVision in Oregon and Washington; League Pass everywhere else
How to listen: Rip City Radio 620AM
Trail Blazers Injuries: Scoot Henderson, Damian Lillard, Matisse Thybulle, Blake Wesley, Jrue Holiday (Out); Donovan Clingan (Questionable).
Raptors Injuries: RJ Barrett (Out).
Three-point Woes. At some point, Portland has to start making threes, right? Statistically, there should be some regression to the mean. A bad three-point shooting team can be expected to get hot for a stretch and raise its average closer to the league average. However, that law of statistics has not held true for the Blazers so far this season. They sit 28th in three-point percentage at just 32.3% from deep.
The difference between Portland and their poor-shooting peers, the Dallas Mavericks and Indiana Pacers — who are second-worst and worst, respectively — is volume. Both the Mavericks and the Pacers are in the bottom half of the league in three-point attempts per game. Conversely, the Blazers are 4th with 42.4 shots from deep per game.
As the adage goes, live by the three, die by the three. And so far this season, Portland is shooting themselves out of games much more often than they are winning games with their threes.
Guard Play. With a plethora of injuries to the backcourt, the Blazers have found themselves relying heavily on Deni Avdija to help fill that gap. So far, Avdija has played incredibly well in that role, including posting a pair of triple-doubles in the last six games. If he can continue to excel in the de facto point guard role, Portland may have enough firepower to overcome a strong Raptors squad.
Flanking Avdija is Shaedon Sharpe, who has struggled in his last two outings as he returned from a calf injury. He averaged just 9.0 points and 21.0 minutes in the last two games against the Spurs and Thunder. His return to form next to Avdija would give the Portland offense a much more dynamic look and take some of the pressure off of Deni to carry the brunt of the scoring load.
Fansided’s Julian Fadullon talked about the unique way Toronto is finding success despite not having a true star.
And their success has looked sustainable as well. Toronto doesn’t just own the third-most wins in the NBA, but also the league’s fourth-best point differentialand assists per game average. Their sheer efficiency as a team continues, as the Raptors also boast a top 10 scoring offense while also taking the fourth-least threes in the NBA. They are top 10 in both offensive and defensive rating. Only the Celtics have taken better care of the ball relative to assists. The stats speak for themselves.
And yet, not a single player in Toronto has emerged as a centerpiece, at least on offense.
Brandon Ingram is the team’s leading scorer (21.8 PPG), but is one of only 10 team points-per-game leaders to average under 22 per game. He is also the only scorer to average under 25 points per game for any top five seed.
On the other side of the coin, Frank Zicarelli from Toronto Sun talks about how that lack of a true star can hurt the Raptors, as was shown in their losses to the Knicks and Hornets.
Barnes has shown flashes, but he has to demand the ball and impose his will on games even more than he has done this season.
Ingram is a bucket-getter, plain and simple. When his shot isn’t dropping, like it was in the fourth quarter and into OT in Charlotte and in New York where he missed his first five attempts, his impact on games is minimal because of his questionable defence.
