Ramon Stoudamire, Tracy McGrady, Vince Carter, Chris Bosh, DeMar DeRozan– Raptors superstars come and go without a championship.
Carter-mania swept Canada in late 1990s with much hoopla, and slamdunks, Carter left without an NBA ring
The Toronto Raptors has come a long way from a Vince Carter-led era.
A quiet and unassuming star in Kawhi Leonard is on the verge of putting the icing on the cake that those early players started.
Kawhi-mania is sweeping Canada, stay tuned as we cover the next 7 or lesser games of the Raptors journey to history and Kawhi Leonard’s immortality in Raptors fans hearts. All points indicate a Raptor win. Vince Carter’s last-second shot against Allen Iverson’s Sixers did not go in.
Kawhi last-second shot against Joel Embid Sixers bounce back in.
We will see if the same Kawhi luck holds against Golden State Warriors.
GO RAPTORS!!
First Quarter Raptors – 25 Golden State – 21
Raptors look jittery at the start, with Lowry’s first pass sailing out of bounce. They settled down and with a stingy switching defence and limiting Stephen Curry, they were able to play toe to toe with the Warriors. Gasol made his first 3-point shot. Raptors end the quarter up by 4.
Second Quarter Raptors – 59 Golden State – 49
Marc Gasol did a great job in the first half with 14 points mixing outside shots with the inside game and playing very good defence. Pascal Siakam also played well scoring 12 points in the half. Raptors capped a 19-8 run with a tough corner 3-point shot from Danny Green to end the second quarter. Raptors finished the first half with its largest lead of the game of 10 points
Third Quarter Raptors – 88 Golden State – 81
The quarter started with a Siakam back to back hit, but Warriors responded with its own Stephen Curry back to back, Kawhi Leonard started to work, and Siakam played his best game of the postseason with inside and outside shots. Two free throws by Kawhi with about 1 minute to go put Raptors up by 7 at the end of the quarter.
Fourth Quarter
Raptors – 118 Golden State – 109 (Final)
Danny Green finally started to hit his shots after a bad Milwaukee series, and Siakam had a monster game finishing with 32 points, highlighted with a follow-up of his own miss with 54 seconds to go. Gasol put up a beautiful game with 20 points and 7 rebounds, fouling out with 1:14 to go. Kyle Lowry, in the bench most of the 4th quarter because of foul trouble came back and hit a long 3 point shot with 29 seconds left that put Raptors up by 12, 118-106 and putting the game away.
RAPTORS WIN THE FIRST GAME!
By Dean de Jesus/ FWH