Morning Coffee - Jan. 30, 2025
Our boys win their 5th straight | Defense has been the recent key | Tempo hire Monica Wright as GM
Quick Reaction: Raptors 106, Wizards 82 - Raptors Republic
D. Mitchell - A
27 MIN, 10 PTS, 4 REB, 9 AST, 0 STL, 4-4 FG, 2-2 3FG, 0-0 FT, 5 TO, 24 +/-
He was hitting late-clock jumpers and drives early, and it made him very complete. When Toronto got sloppy in the second quarter, his playing-within-himself turned into unnecessary turnovers. Good teams need point guards to settle things down during those moments, and Mitchell wasn’t able to. When Toronto got hot in the third, he scored more. When guards score it makes things easy! His defence, as always, was spectacular.
Raptors and Wizards approaching rebuild much differently - Sportsnet
It’s the first time the Raptors have won five straight since April of 2022, the last time the Raptors made the playoffs and the win also assured the Raptors of their first winning month since November of 2023. It’s the first time they’ve won seven of eight games since February of 2023 when Fred VanVleet was still the starting point guard.
The Raptors continued their defensive commitment that has seen them climb to the top of NBA rankings since Jan. 13. They held Washington without a field goal for the first five minutes of the game and to just 25 per cent shooting in the opening quarter, after which they led 31-18 on their way to a 57-38 lead at halftime. The 82 points was the least the Raptors have allowed since they held the pandemic shell of the Golden State Warriors to 77 points on April 2, 2021.
Scottie Barnes led the Raptors with 24 points, four rebounds and four assists to lead seven Raptors in double figures as Toronto had 31 assists on 42 field goals. Meanwhile, they held the Wizards to 38.9 shooting and 5-of-30 from three, while forcing 25 turnovers.
All that said, the Raptors did play well, but this was also the Wizards just Wizarding — they’re the worst offensive (and defensive) team in the NBA.
What the Raptors are right now isn’t entirely clear. Before their little run, the Raptors had the second-worst record in the NBA. At 15-32, the Raptors now have the sixth-worse record. They’ve moved from having a 14 per cent chance at the first pick and a 52 per cent chance at picking in the top four with no possibility of picking worse than sixth to having a nine per cent chance of picking first, a 37.2 per cent chance of picking in the top four and a possibility of picking as far back as 10th.
The Wizards won’t have these concerns. The loss was their 15th straight and dropped their record to 6-40 which translates into a 12-win pace over 82 games, this a season removed from winning 15 last year.
And things will likely get worse before they get better. Washington is widely expected to be trying to trade their quality veterans – former Raptor Jonas Valanciunas, power forward Kyle Kuzma and reserve guard Malcolm Brogdon head that list — for more draft capital at the deadline.
It will be interesting to track which approach ends up bearing fruit. The Raptors, who are trying to rebuild on the fly with a foundation of young-ish veterans like Barnes, Immanuel Quickley (who missed his eighth straight game with a hip strain) and RJ Barrett with a nod to the draft lottery to augment their team? Or the Wizards who have gone bare bones, given the team over to their rookies — no team has given more minutes to rookies this season than Washington — and depending on lottery luck to save them?
At the very least no one can argue the Wizards don’t have clear direction. Where it leads? That’s another thing.
10 Raptors-related thoughts on winning too much, tanking and trade deadline - The Athletic
On Wednesday night, the Toronto Raptors beat the Washington Wizards 106-82, their seventh win in eight games. Before that, they had won eight of their first 39.
In each of the last three games, the Raptors have, at times, outclassed their opponents. The Wizards, New Orleans Pelicans and undermanned Atlanta Hawks are not good, but the idea that these Raptors could dominate any team for a prolonged stretch would have been unimaginable in the season’s first two-and-a-half months.
The Raptors’ poor start caused some of the team’s fans (and probably some members of management) to look at the reverse standings. They were in glorious position to have excellent draft lottery odds. During this stretch, they have gone from being tied with New Orleans for the second-worst record to the sixth-worst mark. In lottery odds, that is the difference between a 52.1-percent chance to get a top-four pick and a 37.2-percent chance. The Portland Trail Blazers are just three wins ahead of them. The Raptors’ odds would fall another 5.3 percent if they passed Portland.
This is all some Raptors fans and observers have been able to think about. I’ve thought about it a fair bit, too. Here is what comes to mind.
The downside, as Raptors fans are finding out right now: It is not fun to be a fan of bad teams in these times, because sometimes the best thing is for those teams to lose. I cannot say Raptors fans are wrong to be anxious about all of their team’s recent (and future?) wins. I have some notes for those fans, but I get it, and I think it is lamentable that sports leagues put fans in this position.
As I wrote early last month, there is more to a rebuild than merely maximizing your lottery odds. The combination of a tough early-season schedule and nonstop injuries made the Raptors seem much worse than they actually are. Scottie Barnes is playing really good basketball, and that bodes well for the future. There have been improvements elsewhere on the roster, from RJ Barrett to Ochai Agbaji to Jamal Shead. Chemistry and cohesion matter, and the Raptors, increasingly, know what coach Darko Rajaković wants from them. All of that matters.
It matters less because of Immanuel Quickley playing just nine games this year. Quickley is supposed to be the point guard of the future, but has had hardly any reps with the players who could be here in the long term. He missed his eighth consecutive game against Washington. The Raptors continue to characterize his status as day-to-day.
The Numbers Crunch: Wizards put on a masterclass in how not to basketball - Bullets Forever
The Washington Wizards are so non-competitive that it’s almost pointless to analyze any single game. Last night, they took on a Toronto Raptors team sitting 12th in the East despite a recent hot streak and got mauled.
How bad was it?
The Wizards didn’t score for the first 5:09.
The Wizards highest-scoring quarter was the garbage time 4th when they managed just 24 points. In the first three quarters, they scored 18, 20, and 20.
The Wizards had their worst offensive outing of the year (an 83 offensive rating) against the NBA’s 26th ranked defense.
The Raptors won by 24 despite a 107 offensive rating. That’s 6.5 points per 100 possessions below average, and 3.5 points below their own season average. Oh yeah, Toronto was ranked 23rd in offense.
In this game, Washington never led, and there were no ties after 0-0. The Raptors led by as much as 29 and won by 24.
In my PPA metric (see below), only two Wizards had games that rated above league average (in PPA, 100 is average and higher is better) — Justin Champagnie, who played 15 minutes (mostly in garbage time), and Richaun Holmes, who played 16 minutes (many of which came in garbage time).
In my PPA metric, no starter had a game that rated above replacement level. The closest was Kyle Kuzma, who probably was hailed in the Monumental postgame show for an epic double-double (19 points, 10 rebounds), but who in truth played yet another abysmal game. Kuzma’s eFG% was 50.0%. League average is 54.0%. He managed one offensive rebound, and one assist in 34 minutes while committing three turnovers. His offensive rating was 93, which is more than 20 points per 100 possessions below league average.
Washington shot 5-30 from three-point range and committed 25 turnovers. Bilal Coulibaly led the team with 4 turnovers.
Jordan Poole was awful — 1-9 from the floor, 0-5 from three, and 2 assists vs. 3 turnovers.
Did anything good happen for the Wizards?
Not really.
Champagnie had 12 points, 6 rebounds, 2 steals, and 2 blocks in 15 minutes.
What’s behind the Raptors’ five-game winning streak? It starts with their defence - Toronto Star
No team in the NBA is defending better than the Raptors over the past seven games, with Toronto holding a 105.4 defensive rating. Coach Darko Rajakovic has often talked about the on-the-ball pressure of players like Davion Mitchell, Bruce Brown and Jamal Shead, but it has been an overall team effort.
And having a healthy Barnes as the focal point at both ends of the court has helped. Barnes has missed 13 games with various injuries, but the 23-year-old Raptors linchpin, fresh off his first Eastern Conference player of the week honour, entered Wednesday averaging 20.2 points, 8.2 rebounds, 6.6 assists and 34.8 minutes.
He imposed his dominance early against the Wizards and energized his team with timely cuts to the basket, precise passes and key defensive plays. He helped the Raptors build a 29-point lead before sitting out a big chunk of the fourth quarter. He still had a game-high 24 points as well as four rebounds and four assists.
All Raptors players logged fewer than 30 minutes in this game, with both teams emptying their benches early in the fourth quarter when the outcome was no longer in doubt. Jakob Poeltl just missed out on a double-double as he had 12 points, eight rebounds and six assists, and RJ Barrett contributed 11 points in the win. Eight Raptors scored in double figures.
“I feel like this has been coming for us,” Poeltl said. “we’ve put in work all season long and now this stretch of eight, 10 games or so we’ve been really solid defensively, and now it’s just about keeping that up, keep cleaning up our mistakes,” Poeltl said in an on-court interview after the game. “Winning is a lot of fun.”
Kyle Kuzma had 19 points and 10 rebounds for the Wizards. Washington (6-40) has lost 14 straight games.
Toronto’s defence limited Washington to 38 points in the first half on 34 per cent shooting (13 per cent from three), the lowest mark Wizards have scored in the opening half this season. Toronto forced Washington into 16 turnovers in that span.
“We wanted to show the world that … we really guard, it’s not just for the past seven games but we do this every game,” Mitchell told Sportsnet at halftime, with Toronto up by 19 points.
Surging Raptors win fifth straight for first time since 2022 with blowout in D.C. - Toronto Sun
Toronto was -275 favourites, by far the most the team has been favoured in a game this season. That made sense since Washington had gone 4-37 since starting the season 2-2 and has been in last place in the NBA standings since Nov. 22. In addition to this current skid, the team also has dropped 16 in a row this season.
Toronto was again without starting point guard Immanuel Quickley, but starting shooting guard Gradey Dick joined him on the shelf due to illness, with Kelly Olynyk also unable to play due to a right calf strain.
Washington was without veterans Malcolm Brogdon and Marvin Bagley III, and 2024 No. 2 overall selection Alex Sarr.
Toronto got off to a 16-2 lead as the Wizards shot 25% in the first quarter, falling behind 31-18.
Toronto ranked 25th in the NBA in defensive efficiency heading in, but eighth over the previous 10 games and first over the past seven, a remarkable turnaround.
Those numbers will be getting even better after this one. The Raptors held the Wizards to a season-low 38 points in the first half, forced them into 15 turnovers and only 2-for-15 three-point shooting.
The visitors kept pouring it on in the third, stretching the lead to 27 early on and up to as many as 28 before Washington cut it to 80-58 heading into the fourth.
At times the Wizards looked like a group of players who had been plucked off the street. Shots refused to fall (they started 4-for-25 from three-point distance), they couldn’t take care of the ball (25 turnovers against only 17 assists) and gave up way too many shots in the paint. It was bad enough that midway through the fourth, Washington had the same number of made field goals as turnovers.
Toronto Tempo hire Monica Wright Rogers as General Manager - Raptors Republic
Wright is a former WNBA player with championship experience as she won two WNBA titles during her career. After she retired Wright ventured into front office work and served as an assistant general manager on the Phoenix Mercury. With her experience in the league and in the front office, Tempo ownership has chosen Wright to build the Toronto Tempo into an eventual successful team.
The Toronto Tempo will begin competing in games in 2026, where Wright will get her first taste of building her own roster. This is a foundational moment for the development of women’s basketball and Canadian basketball, and it gives basketball fans around the world another team to follow and enjoy.
