Toronto Takes the Cake: Raptors vs. Nets Game Four (August 23, 2020)
The Toronto Raptors faced off against the Brooklyn Nets in game four of their first round matchup. The Raptors looked to finish off a sweep, while Brooklyn was trying to pull off an upset and keep their season alive.
The game started out with the Nets getting hot. Caris LeVert (35 pts, 6 reb, 6 ast, 2 stl) was looking good very early on, while Marc Gasol (9 pts, 4 reb, 5 ast) was getting hot for Toronto. Brooklyn always plays with a ton of energy so their early success wasn’t surprising at all. The difficult part comes when they have to keep it up against the Raptors’ variety of offensive weapons.
Tyler Johnson (13 pts, 3 reb) started to heat up, too, giving LeVert a little bit of help on the offensive end. Those two guys had 22 out of Brooklyn’s first 25 points, with the other points coming from a single three from Garrett Temple (10 pts). That’s fine for the short term success of the Nets, but more guys were going to have to get going if they wanted a chance.
Meanwhile, Toronto saw offensive production from every single starter. Pascal Siakam (20 pts, 6 reb, 10 ast, 2 stl) started playing well as he was being guarded by Jarrett Allen (8 pts, 15 reb) this game. Allen was going as well as he could, but Siakam is just too athletic for him to stay in front of.
Normal Powell (29 pts, 5 reb) came off the bench for Nick Nurse at the end of the first and helped give Toronto an extra boost of offense. Dzanan Musa (12 pts) did the same for Brooklyn around the same time. Both teams looked good, but a huge dunk from Terrence Davis (14 pts, 4 reb) gave the Raps some momentum moving into the second.
Jacque Vaughn matched up Timothé Luwawu-Cabarrot (11 pts, 3 reb, 2 stl) against Serge Ibaka (27 pts, 15 reb, 2 blk) and it was not going well. Ibaka put in work on the offensive end as he was able to simply shoot over the shorter TLC. Toronto’s lead was very slowly getting bigger and bigger.
LeVert continued to be unreal scoring the ball. No matter how contested he was or how much the Raptors threw at him he was just getting everything to fall. Brooklyn’s offense wasn’t a huge issue, it was just their ability to stop the Raptors that was subpar.
Kyle Lowry (2 pts, 2 reb, 3 ast, 9 mins) left the game late in the first with what seemed to be an ankle injury. It was then reported in the second quarter that he would be out for the rest of the game. It didn’t look too serious, so I assume they were just airing on the side of caution by keeping him out. That being said, if it is worse than it looked, missing Lowry would be a gigantic loss moving forward in the playoffs.
Toronto’s bench was rolling in the second quarter, with the Nets having absolutely nothing to counter them with. Outside of Allen, Brooklyn was running a super small lineup and Nurse was having his guys play bully ball. The Raps were too strong, too talented, and too quick for the Nets to deal with. Ibaka was especially cooking, as he managed to score 19 points and collect nine rebounds in the first half alone.
As I’ve said time and time again, though, the Nets are a scrappy bunch of guys. They were constantly keeping Toronto’s lead to no more than 10 or 12, and by the time halftime rolled around Brooklyn was only down 77-68.
The Raptors opened up the second half strong while the Nets began the third quarter shooting 0-3 from the field. TLC continued to struggle shooting the ball and the Raps defense was relentless. On the other hand, Powell continued to wreak havoc on the Nets, extending the Raptors lead early in the second half.
Things were getting really out of hands for Brooklyn. Their offense wasn’t terrible in the first half, but in the second their percentages plummeted. No one could get anything to fall. On top of that, they had no answer for the offensive onslaught of Toronto. Everyone on that roster has the ability to score the ball, and Brooklyn simply doesn’t have the talent to match up. It resulted in a 20+ point lead growing by the midway point of the third.
By the time the third was over the Raptors’ lead was nearing 30 and the game was pretty much over. There was just nothing the Nets could do to slow them down.
The fourth was exactly what you would expect in a blowout win. Toronto takes the series in a sweep over the Nets, winning the final game 150-122.
