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Pick A Side: Who's more likely to advance - Raptors or Heat?

Nick Turchiaro / Reuters

The Toronto Raptors broke through to the second round with a series victory over the Indiana Pacers. The second seed in the East, the Raptors now meet the third-seeded Miami Heat with a trip to the Eastern Conference Finals on the line, generating a hotly debated issue in the lead-up to Tuesday's Game 1:

Should the Raptors or Heat be favored to win their second-round series?

Joseph Casciaro: Their struggle to shed the NBA's biggest first-round monkey against the Pacers may have distracted from the fact that the Raptors won 56 games and went 14-7 against the other seven remaining playoff teams, including taking three of four from Miami. The Raps have also only lost back-to-back games once over the last 10 weeks.

Gino Bottero: Toronto also took three of four from Indiana during the regular year, but that success didn't carry into the postseason. The Raptors gave the Pacers every opportunity to win that series, but Indiana just wouldn't take it. That won't be an issue with the Heat and Dwyane Wade, whose 159 career postseason games are more than the Raptors have participated in as a franchise.

Casciaro: Wade's previous 159 playoff games and Toronto's franchise history will mean little when the ball is tipped Tuesday. As for the Indiana series, another way to look at it is the Raps played some of their worst ball of the season, the Pacers had the best player in the entire first round (Paul George), Kyle Lowry and DeMar DeRozan combined to shoot 31.8 percent, and Toronto still emerged victorious.

Bottero: DeRozan shot 39.1 percent from the field in his playoff career entering this season, and Lowry's elbow is clearly more of an issue than the team is letting on. The bigger issue is the Raptors defense, which figures to have issues with the Heat's 3-point-loving small-ball lineup. In the opening round, the Pacers hit on 38.3 percent of their 3-point attempts. By comparison, only the Golden State Warriors connected from deep at a better rate during the regular season.

Casciaro: The Heat's three-heavy attack is certainly an issue for a Raptors team that gives up threes at a sometimes alarming rate. Like Toronto, however, Miami's offense bogs down in late game situations, and often ends in iso-heavy, Wade hero ball. Wade's Hall of Fame resume notwithstanding, with defenders like DeMarre Carroll and breakout rookie Norman Powell on the Raps' roster, that could spell disaster for the Heat.

Bottero: The Raptors received a big boost from Jonas Valanciunas in the opening round, as he often dominated the Pacers' shallow front court. That advantage will be negated by Heat big man Hassan Whiteside, who averaged a double-double and better than three blocks in the opening round.

Casciaro: Whiteside got better from a team-defense perspective as the year wore on, but he's still prone to block-chasing and foul-prone binges that compromise Miami's D. Against a team that plays downhill and has a trio of guards who drive relentlessly in DeRozan, Lowry, and Cory Joseph, the Raptors could expose him. Not to mention, the Hornets scored almost at will around the rim against Whiteside's Heat.

Related: 3 questions ahead of Raptors-Heat series

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