MAMASA TERKINI - All week the Raptors
had been talking about how they couldn’t wait for it: The hype, the
noise, the buzz of playoff basketball. They couldn’t wait to stand amid
the white-out of a sellout at the Air Canada Centre and revel in the
spectacle. But they also couldn’t
know how they’d handle the moment of their franchise’s first
post-season game in six years. And now they do: Wholly predictably.
The home team played hard enough in their 94-87 Game 1 loss to the Brooklyn Nets,
but they also played with the jittery hesitation that the first steps
on a big stage can bring. The tell-tale stat: They coughed up 11
first-half turnovers and 19 all told, this from a team that averaged a
respectable 14 a game during the regular season.
And if they had their flashes of brilliance, including a 17-point, 18-rebound gem from 21-year-old centre Jonas Valanciunas,
they were ultimately shown up by Brooklyn’s relentless, veteran calm.
When Paul Pierce, the 36-year-old Nets forward who has played more
playoff minutes than the entire Toronto roster combined, methodically
reeled off nine points in the final three minutes, he appeared amused in
the knowledge he was sticking a knife in the heart of the home crowd’s
big occasion.
But buck up, Raptors
Nation. As head coach Dwane Casey was saying after it was over: “If our
fans are disappointed, they’re not truly fans. They’re come-lately fans
... It’s one game ... Let’s get educated on basketball.”
Indeed, the
franchise’s brief post-season record book suggests playoff-debut flops
aren’t portends of certain death. Vince Carter went 3 for 20 from the
field in his back in 2000 and the Raptors — well, they got swept by the
Knicks that year, but as then-Knicks coach Jeff Van Gundy was recalling
recently, the games were all tough and close.
And Chris Bosh was
hamstrung by early foul trouble in his maiden run back in 2006, and in
that instance the Raptors — well, they ultimately lost the series to
another incarnation of veteran Nets. But it could have gone either way,
sort of.
So let’s just say
DeMar DeRozan joined esteemed company with Sunday’s 3-for-13 no-show.
When DeRozan had faced questions about his team’s collective greenness
this week, he had scoffed; navigating the NBA’s championship tournament wasn’t exactly “rocket science,” he said. Perhaps not. But it sometimes can seem like repeating history.
Sam Mitchell, who
coached the Raptors the previous couple of times they were in the
playoffs, was remembering this week how his team, led by a newbie named
Bosh, was “overwhelmed” by a 2006 home Game 1. On Saturday, Casey said
essentially the same thing. The spotlight, the rare appearance on ESPN,
it all fed into a flop. “As expected,” said Casey.
Still, if Sunday’s
butter-fingers act was out of character for the home team, certainly it
went with the tenor of the day. Raptors general manager Masai Ujiri
cranked the thermostat on the series before the ball was tipped,
punctuating an otherwise stock pep-rally speech before the throng in
Maple Leaf Square with an emphatic conclusion. It went: “F--- Brooklyn!”
Several MLSE employees
who’ve known Ujiri for years, when told of the comment, couldn’t
believe he’d said it. Ujiri’s mostly a soft-spoken gentleman. But he’d
said it. There was video to prove it. And he wasn’t ducking it.
“I love Brooklyn ...
Just trying to rile up the fans,” Ujiri said shortly after, by which
time Twitter had exploded in a mix of shock and admiration for his
brashness.
Later, when the
growing fuss required a hastily called halftime press scrum, Ujiri
offered up a not-so-apologetic apology: “You know how I feel. I don’t
like (the Nets). But I apologize.”
The Raptors, totally
coincidentally, will not be staying in Brooklyn when the series shifts
there later this week. They prefer the hotel stock in Manhattan.
There was plenty to
love about Ujiri’s slightly reckless use of the language. Said Casey:
“He’s a fiery guy ... That should represent how we all feel.”
Certainly it flipped
the home team’s identity on its head. The Raptors, who never imagined at
the season’s outset that they’d be a 48-win three seed, came into the
playoffs as the series underdog. To a man they could have added Just
Happy To Be Here to their tattoo collections. The Nets, meanwhile, whose
$190-million salary and luxury tax bill is the highest in NBA history,
have always fancied themselves as championship contenders, never mind
the 44 regular-season wins.
The home team’s best
hope might have been to catch Brooklyn looking past them — which is what
the Nets were doing tanking for a second-round matchup with the Miami
Heat, against whom the Nets are 4-0 this season. But it took two words
for Ujiri to recast his team as the condescending, cocky ones.
As the Raptors slogan goes, “We The North” — and also, the semi-apologetically obnoxious.
That’s fine, so long
as the players back it up. There’s pent-up demand for some Toronto team,
any Toronto team, to be an unrepentant alpha dog. As Raptors fan Mario
Kappos said before the game, this as he stood among the face-painted,
full-throated throng not far from Maple Leaf Square wearing a Canada
flag as a cape emblazoned with the words “Why Not Us?”: “I believe in
this team. Why not us?”
The Raptors, at least,
made a case for optimism. They turned it over 19 times and drew
precisely one foul to Brooklyn’s half dozen in the fourth quarter and
they still were as close as three points with a little less than four
minutes to go.
The Nets, mind you,
could roll out similar rationalizations. Brooklyn missed 19 straight
three-pointers before Pierce made the one that began his late onslaught;
the visitors, 11th in the league in three-point shooting this season,
finished 4 for 24 from deep. And they won.
But if DeRozan shows
up, if Amir Johnson chooses to attend, if Terrence Ross avoids foul
trouble and finds his range — it’s not rocket science. In some ways it’s
as simple as a roll call. Playoffs or otherwise, big forum or small,
ideally the franchise’s fieriest guy shouldn’t be wearing the suit and
tie.http://www.thestar.com
