It was a season-low for the two-time All-Star, and the head coach gave his thoughts about the blowout loss to the Detroit Pistons.
Brandon Ingram and the Toronto Raptors fell 113-95 Wednesday to the Detroit Pistons in their final game before the NBA All-Star Break. The top seed in the Eastern Conference was without its frontcourt duo of Jalen Duren and Isaiah Stewart after the pair received suspensions from the NBA following a fight during their game against the Charlotte Hornets.
In their absences, forward Paul Reed made just his seventh start of the season for Detroit and played his most minutes of the season with 33. He made the most of his opportunity against Toronto, supplying 22 points, five rebounds, four blocks, and three steals with a box plus/minus of +21.
Detroit Pistons forward/center Paul Reed (7) | © John E. Sokolowski-Imagn Images
Ingram, Toronto’s leading scorer this season, was held to just seven shot attempts in Scotiabank Arena. This marked his first game with single-digit field goal attempts in games that he played at least 15 minutes this season. The former No. 2 pick in the 2016 NBA Draft earned his second career All-Star appearance this season largely due to his effortless scoring ability.
Postgame, head coach Darko Rajakovic had a bright perspective of the unusually quiet performance for the former Duke Blue Devil. When asked if he felt the 6-foot-8, 190-pound forward was seeing more double-teams recently than usual, the Serbian head coach gave a higher-level breakdown of the defense he was seeing.
“It was not that much doubles,” said Rajakovic. “It was switching off-ball screens. It was a lot of those guard situations. They were switching, and were just preventing him to get the ball. When he would get into his moves they were really trying to clog the whole paint and come and help there. Sometimes it was two guys, and it was three guys coming to him. It’s going to be really good film for us to take a look where we can do better from this game.”
Being that Detroit was without its All-Star center and primary backup, this should be a great game to dissect overall for what went wrong for Toronto. In what seemed like a winnable game at home against a semi-depleted team, the Raptors were punched in the mouth early and were never able to recover.
This has become a typical story for the Raptors this season. While they still sit at the fifth seed in the Eastern Conference, they have thrived against the mediocre teams around the league. Against the top 10 teams in the NBA, Toronto has a record of 4-13. If its record of 3-0 against the Cleveland Cavaliers is taken out of the equation, that record plummets to 1-13.
Toronto Raptors head coach Darko Rajakovic | © John Jones-Imagn Images
In other news, starting center Jakob Poeltl made his first appearance since late December, after missing 24 straight games with a lower back strain. Although he played just 20 minutes in his return, it’s a good sign for Raptors fans that he is finally back, so that the starting lineup can build continuity heading into postseason play.