Raptors crumble en route to another disappointing playoff defeat

CLEVELAND - At morning shootaround, prior to Game 4 against the Cavaliers, Toronto Raptors swingman C.J. Miles was comfortably slumped on a courtside chair, fielding questions about trailing 3-0 to LeBron James and Co.

It was a familiar position - not only for the Raptors, but for Miles, who was swept by Cleveland in the first round as a member of the Indiana Pacers last season.

“There’s no lack of confidence,” Miles said. “We don’t feel overmatched or anything, there’s none of that. It’s just about knowing where we have to draw the line in some of the things we need to do to get over that hump. All three games have presented different plays that would have to be done at certain points of the game to get over the hump. We see them. It’s not like there’s no door to get out of the room, you know?”

Monday night, LeBron and the Cavaliers slammed that door in the Raptors' face, leaving Masai Ujiri with more questions than answers after yet another sensational season ruined by a humbling loss to Cleveland.

In Game 1, the Raptors shrunk down the stretch, missed four opportunities to win the game on the final possession in the fourth quarter, and became the second team in the last 20 seasons to lose a playoff game after leading for all of regulation. In Game 2, the Cavaliers scored 128 points against three turnovers, and Toronto became the second team since 1980 to shoot over 50 percent from the field, over 40 percent from three, and over 90 percent from the free-throw line, and lose a playoff game.

Game 3 was probably this core group’s best road playoff performance. And yet, a valiant fourth-quarter comeback was snuffed out by LeBron's game-winner at the buzzer. At practice on Sunday, Kyle Lowry spoke about keeping the fight going in Game 4 despite the odds.

“Rumble, young man, rumble,” Lowry said, referring to Muhammad Ali’s famous proclamation before his 1964 fight with Sonny Liston.

Instead, the Raptors crumbled.

Toronto continued the defensive mistakes that plagued them the entire series. Miscommunications in their transition defense led to two breakaway dunks from George Hill early in the first quarter. The Cavs got open looks from three over and over again. Kyle Korver, J.R. Smith, and George Hill combined to make all 10 of their shots, scoring 23 points in the first 12 minutes. James played 29 minutes and coasted his way to 29 points, eight rebounds, and 11 assists. The Cavs won by 35 points, and it wasn’t that close.

The Raptors never found the door to even a single victory against the Cavaliers, and have now lost 10 straight playoff games against James over three postseasons.

“They showed their championship pedigree,” head coach Dwane Casey said afterward. “(The Cavs) are a great example for us. The difference between the regular season and a playoff run … There’s another level we have to learn to get to, to make a commitment to get to, as an organization and as a team.”

To simply say 'the Raptors have run into James the last three postseasons' feels like a lazy argument, excusing them for some of the mistakes that were made in this series. Players did not execute. Casey was once again slow to make adjustments, find optimal lineups, and push the right buttons. The team never found a defensive game plan that worked, and seemed indecisive over wanting to stay on James and preventing the shooters from getting off, instead, they allowed everything to happen.

“As a coaching staff,” Casey said. “Everything we tried to do just didn’t click.”

That has become a Toronto postseason tradition.

The Raptors, even with a culture reset and changing parts on the roster, have put together game plans and executed at a level that has left a lot to be desired. Casey has proven that he can be adaptable over the course of the regular season, and that he can develop young guys and give them definable roles over 82 games. But he hasn’t given the Raptors an advantage in the playoffs, where it becomes a chess match over a seven-game series.

A coaching change would be the easiest move for the team, but at some point, Ujiri might have to wonder whether the Lowry-Demar DeRozan backcourt can carry them any further, even with an improved supporting cast. DeRozan’s year-to-year improvement during his NBA career has been admirable, but the Cavaliers made him a non-factor in the series.

“We schemed for it,” Cavaliers head coach Tyronn Lue said.

Down two games to none in the series, facing a must-win game on the road, DeRozan went 3-for-12 in 28 minutes and didn’t play in the fourth quarter. In Game 4, DeRozan finished with 13 points in 33 minutes, and was ejected late in the third quarter after a flagrant-2 foul on Jordan Clarkson.

Per Ben Golliver of Sports Illustrated, DeRozan’s three worst plus-minus performances of the season came in the last three games of the series. A minus-22 in Game 2, a minus-23 in Game 3, and a minus-29 in Game 4.

“We couldn’t get it done,” DeRozan said. “We have opportunity, after opportunity, after opportunity … We couldn’t pull off the big challenge of going up against a guy like (LeBron).”

If it’s not LeBron, it’s going to be another team with a superstar and a scheme that takes Toronto’s star guard out of his comfort zone. After a series like this, especially with the expectations that come with the most successful regular season in franchise history, Ujiri has to wonder whether the sample size for playoff disappointments for both Casey and DeRozan has reached a point where it's time to make a move.

There are no easy ways to break up this team. DeRozan, Lowry, and Serge Ibaka are all under contract for the next two seasons. After a disappointing playoff run, it will be hard to find a trade market for Ibaka, and the Raptors are likely not looking to attach draft assets or any of their young players to make a deal work. If you trade DeRozan, then it would make sense to move Lowry, even though he had a very impressive playoff showing.

The problem with Lowry is two-fold if the Raptors decide it’s time to transition from this core group. First, Lowry is almost too good of a player to not keep around. Lowry and the bench unit, especially if you bet on some internal improvement from that group next season, is probably still good enough to earn a playoff spot in the East. Second, Lowry is 32 and might not be that valuable of a commodity in the trade market.

So the alternative is to keep the team together, run it back, as they say, bet on the younger guys getting better, and eventually, players like OG Anunoby, Delon Wright, and Pascal Siakam might be ready for bigger roles when the team is ready to move on from this core group in a few years.

Logically, this is the right path for the Raptors. Ujiri has already started to pave the way to not only compete as a playoff team in the present, but he has also put in pieces for them to move on from Lowry, DeRozan, and Ibaka in two years. But logic also said this Raptors team, the best in franchise history, was finally ready for the spotlight against James and the Cavaliers; instead, they're back to where they started, wondering if the current team deserves another chance.

Those decisions will now rest on Ujiri, who has done a remarkable job of building a perennial playoff contender without a top-10 player. The irony is, he might have done such a good job that tearing it down will end up being more challenging than building it up.

Alex Wong is an NBA freelance writer whose work has appeared in GQ, The New Yorker, Vice Sports, and Complex, among other publications.

(Photos courtesy: Getty Images)