Key: They the North
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The Wine & Gold close out the decade on Tuesday night – taking on the shorthanded Raptors on New Year’s Eve in Toronto to wrap up a three-game trip.
The Cavaliers – who return home for the next four – have won four of their last five, including a Saturday night nail-biter in Minnesota. That victory might not have been cosmetically appealing, but John Beilein’s squad showed true grit – holding the Timberwolves to 36 percent shooting and fending off a late rally to get back in the win column one day after dropping a lopsided decision in Boston.
The Raptors, playing without three of their top guys – Pascal Siakam, Marc Gasol and Norman Powell – avenged a Christmas Day loss to the Celtics before dropping their most recent contest at home, a 98-97 thriller with Canadian native, Shai Gilgeous-Alexander banking home the game-winner.
Cleveland dropped its first meeting here in Toronto two weeks ago – with Siakam leading all scorers with 33 points in the 20-point win. These two teams square off one more time this season when the World Champs make their lone visit to Rocket Mortgage FieldHouse on January 30.
Key: Middle Management
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For his work with the Canadian national team, Tristan Thompson got a nice video tribute the last time the Cavaliers came to Scotiabank Arena. And the ninth-year man from Texas – and native of nearby Brampton – has always performed well when he comes home.
On that night, Thompson finished with 18 points, eight boards and three assists. Since then, he’s been his normal rock-solid self – grabbing double-digit boards in four of his last five outings, including his 16th double-double of the season on Saturday night in Minnesota, finishing with 12 points and a season-high-tying 15 rebounds.
In the victory, Thompson went 8-of-10 from the stripe, canning a pair of clutch free throws in the closing moments to seal the deal.
With two of Toronto’s top bigs – Siakam and Gasol – likely still on the shelf for the New Year’s Eve matchup, Tristan will take on another veteran of past playoff wars, Serge Ibaka.
The 10-year veteran has been one of the better reserves in the East this year – leading Toronto’s reserves in scoring through the first seven games of the season – and he’s been even better as a starter, averaging 16.0 points and 9.3 rebounds in those contests. Over his last six games, Ibaka has piled up four double-doubles.
He’s topped the 20-point plateau twice over the past two weeks and is coming off a solid showing in the Raps recent loss to OKC – finishing with 12 points and a season-high-tying 14 boards.
Key: Guarded Optimism
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The Raptors have undergone some major changes over the years, but one constant has been veteran guard Kyle Lowry.
Lowry notched 20 points in Toronto’s Monday night loss to the Thunder, his seventh 20-point game in his last eight outings – averaging 24.0 points per over that stretch. One of those games was a 20-point effort in the previous meeting with the Wine and Gold, canning three threes and handing out a game-best 11 assists.
Lowry’s backcourt partner, Fred VanVleet, has made another step up this year and he comes into tonight’s contest as Toronto’s third-leading scorer at 18.2ppg. Like Lowry, VanVleet – who didn’t play in the first meeting with Cleveland this year – finished with 20 points in Monday’s loss to the Thunder.
VanVleet has posted five double-doubles this year after netting just one through his first three seasons. He is third in the NBA, averaging 2.1 steals per game.
The Cavs backcourt has been pretty solid in its own right of late – led by Collin Sexton, who’s averaging 19.6ppg over his last eight games, including another rock-solid showing on Saturday night, finishing with 18 points and a season-high-tying seven boards in the win. In Cleveland’s previous meeting against Toronto, the Young Bull led Cleveland with 25 points on 10-of-16 shooting from the floor.
Darius Garland – who had 20 points of his own in his first visit to Toronto, going 7-of-14 from the floor to go with five assists – is also coming off a nice effort against Minnesota. In the victory, the rookie from Vanderbilt tallied 18 points on 8-of-11 shooting, drilling a pair of clutch triples in the fourth quarter to help ice the win.