3 unlikely heroes who saved the Raptors in Game 2

It wasn’t the star backcourt of DeMar DeRozan and Kyle Lowry who won Game 2 for the Toronto Raptors, that’s for damn sure.

No, the lonely midnight shooting sessions didn’t help. Lowry posted a 10th-straight game where he shot less than 40 percent after going 7–22 from the field. He passed up a half-dozen layups with Hassan Whiteside guarding the paint, and remained ice-cold from deep (1–7).

As for DeMar DeRozan, he made every Raptors fan tear their hair out with a seemingly endless barrage of midrange jumpers. Of his 24 field-goal attempts, 13 came from the midrange, and another five came from the free-throw line area against three shots at the rim. He also inexplicably shot 3–8 from the free-throw line.

Make no mistake: the Raptors need their star players to perform in order to beat the Miami Heat. This isn’t sustainable. If Lowry and DeRozan keep shooting 16–46 the Raptors are done. But at least for a night, the supporting cast stepped up and an abject disaster was averted.

Here’s three players who saved the day.

The game ball goes to Jonas Valanciunas.

(Stop me if you’ve heard this one before) The Raptors were shy to find Valanciunas early on. Whiteside has been a thorn in their side all series and the Raptors’ guards were more interested in “emptying their clips” rather than threading tough post-entry passes.

Valanciunas inexplicably had just four points on three shots through three quarters. But he saved his best for last.

Even with a lid on the rim, Lowry and DeRozan were still hesitant to find Valanciunas. The big Lithuanian had to take matters into his own hands, collecting two tough putbacks down the stretch — one off a Lowry jumper where he beat two defenders for the rebound and banked it in with his left, another where he overpowered Whiteside for a tip-in following two missed free throws by DeRozan.

Valanciunas also delivered in the few instances where he was asked to post-up. He easily nudged past Whiteside for a signature sweeping right hook, worked another post-up into two free-throws (that stopped a 17–2 Heat run) and in overtime, Valanciunas stopped on a dime off a pick-and-roll to slot home a silky free-throw line jumper.

Most importantly, Valanciunas also brought it on defense. Whiteside shot 1–3 in the fourth quarter and overtime. Valanciunas compounded those struggles with three steals and a massive block on a hook shot from Whiteside.

Valanciunas won that damn game, and the guards should take notice. Feed the fucking big man. We’ve only been saying it for three straight years.

When the Raptors signed DeMarre Carroll, he was meant to be the stopper on the wing who filled in where he could on offense.

It was pretty much the opposite in Game 2. Carroll was badly outmuscled by Joe Johnson in pick-and-roll scenarios and Dwane Casey even had to dust off James Johnson’s underutilized corpse in a surreal break-in-emergency scenario. Iso-Joe torched Carroll for 17 through three quarters.

But Carroll made up for it on offense. He hit three triples (including one where Dwyane Wade dared him to shoot and he promptly popped it in his eye), drove the lane for awkward floaters, and somehow finished with 21 points on 13 shots.

Carroll also held down the fort as a smallball power forward. His defense down the stretch was stellar, he helped Valanciunas on the glass, and he recorded four steals.

You can always count on Cory Joseph to elevate his game. He’s one of the few Raptors who doesn’t get caught up in the moment.

Joseph struggled with foul trouble, but he can hardly be faulted for that. He was asked to tackle the most difficult assignment each time out. Joseph split time checking Goran Dragic, Dwyane Wade, and in overtime, he gave up 60 pounds in a match-up against Johnson.

But sure enough, Joseph was the only one who consistently stopped Johnson. The slippery Joseph simply refused to be screened as he always stuck with Johnson despite being forced to maneuver around massive picks from Whiteside. He put just enough pressure on Johnson to miss his last four shots in overtime — the last one of which was an airball.

The same goes for Joseph’s time on Wade and Dragic. He gave up size in each match-up but fought through to always keep a body on them.

The final line reads as usual: eight points, four assists in 26 minutes. But the Raptors would not have won without Joseph’s defense down the stretch.

10 things I saw from Game 2

1. Carroll has to do a better job bodying up Johnson on the middle pick-and-rolls. It’s not palatable to expect Joseph and James Johnson to clean up his messes.
2. If there’s one positive takeaway from Games 1 and 2, it’s the defense. The Raptors have held Miami to an offensive-rating of 95.1. They’ve only conceded 25 3-pointers and 56 midrange shots.
3. Terrence Ross has been oddly amazing off the bench. The Heat have no answer for his pull-ups because those are normally the shots that defenses are willing to concede. But he’s been money when given an inch of airspace, and he even drilled one in the dying minutes of regulation.
4. DeRozan and Lowry have to stop passing up chances to attack Whiteside. Getting him off the court is the first step to unlocking the Raptors’ putrid offense.
5. Bismack Biyombo might not have a role in this series. The Heat don’t really attack the rim and their guards are really only hurting the Raptors from the midrange off screens, which Bismack can’t really help with. Toronto is minus-18 with him on the court.
6. Given his strength and versatility, giving Biyombo’s minutes to Johnson while sliding Patterson to power forward might be a solution. It would help the offense, at least.
7. Raptors have a horrible tendency to slow down their offense every time things go bad. But to lop off 14 seconds before starting a possession is pure insanity. At least have some off-ball motion to see if any mismatches arise.
8. I understand why isolations are smart in tie games before overtime, but the Raptors had 10 seconds to draw something up and they came up with:

9. Dragic’s drives are a major problem. He’s the engine of Miami’s offense right now. I might give thought to switching Norman Powell on him and letting Lowry take his chances with Dwyane Wade.

10. It’s 1–1. A long series is ahead.