Lowry Plays Hero As Raptors Force Game 7
What more can be said about Kyle Lowry?
For eight years he's been the foundation of the Toronto Raptors, turning a perennial bottom-dwelling franchise into one of the NBA's premier organizations. His career is littered with incredible playoff moments: Game 5 against Brooklyn in 2014, Game 6 of the 2019 NBA Finals against Golden State, Game 3 against the Celtics this year, and now Game 6 once again.
It's a list that was unthinkable just a few years ago when questions swirled about his ability to win in the playoffs. But now there can be no questioning Lowry's resume as he scored 33 points, including the game-winning fadeaway jumper over Kemba Walker, to seal a 125-122 overtime victory in a must-win Game 6 against the Boston Celtics.
“That’s what great players do,” Raptors coach Nick Nurse said. “That’s what the tough players do, and he is man, he is a great one. He’s fun to watch. He’s the ultimate competitor. Toughness and he steps into it. He’s not afraid of the moment. He made some big ones for sure.”
Even at 34 years old Lowry doesn’t cease to amaze the NBA world. He played 53 minutes on Wednesday night, most of them with three stitches in his chin after taking an elbow from Brad Wanamaker in the second quarter.
“Three beautiful stitches,” Lowry joked. “Doc did a beautiful job.”
What’s made this playoff run even more impressive for Lowry is the way he’s been able to step up in the playoffs with Pascal Siakam struggling. All season Siakam was viewed as the Raptors’ top guy, but when he began to struggle in the playoffs, Lowry stepped up.
“My role has changed so many times since I've been here,” Lowry said. “But it don’t matter, as long as we win games, I'm always going to ride with my teammates, whatever they need from me.”
Lowry’s scoring onslaught started right from the first quarter when he scored a four-point play to help invigorate the Raptors' offense early. A quarter later, with things quickly getting out of hand, he responded to a Nurse timeout by attacking the hoop, going right at Robert Williams III for a pull-up jumper.
Then, in winning time, he nailed a pair of 3-pointers to put the Raptors up five in the fourth.
“Kyle’s been big time all year and all my five years here, making big plays, giving up his body for the team, taking charges out on the floor, and we need that. He’s our leader,” Raptors guard Norman Powell said. “We go as he goes.”
It was a lead the Raptors wouldn't hang onto, though. The half-court offensive struggles that had plagued Toronto all season reappeared late in the fourth quarter as the Raptors couldn't score a single bucket in the final four minutes of regulation.
Late in the quarter, Siakam tried attacking Marcus Smart in isolation, but the Celtics’ defender poked the ball loose, allowing Boston to tie it up with a Daniel Theis dunk.
With two seconds to go in regulation, OG Anunoby appeared to have an opportunity to give the Raptors a last-second lead. He went up for an alley-oop on the inbounds pass, but Jayson Tatum fouled him, stopping the inbound and giving the Celtics life.
Once overtime started, Powell awoke from his playoff slumber. He had come into the game averaging just 8.6 points per game in the series. At times it was so ugly he was almost unplayable, forcing Nurse to use his starters for long minutes. But when the Raptors needed a hero in the clutch, Powell delivered, scoring 15 points in the final two overtime periods to clinch victory.
“The playoffs is always about the role players,” Lowry said. “It’s about the guys that can sort of us give us something and coach rode with Norm, and Norm was big tonight. Big, huge threes, and-1, free throws, some good defence down the stretch but that’s just playoff basketball.”
Powell finished the night with 23 points, the second-most of any Raptors player.
Outside of Lowry, that was sort of the theme of Game 6. The Raptors did it the way they had all season, using a committee approach to defeat opposing teams, with six players in double figures.
“That’s kinda how we decided to play,” Nurse said. “Everybody should be a threat on offence, everybody can contribute, everybody can shoot the ball so we need everybody to do that.”
Even with Serge Ibaka playing well early and Marc Gasol breaking out of his shooting funk in the third quarter, the Raptors went to their smallball lineup with Lowry, Fred VanVleet, Powell, Siakam and Anunoby for almost the entire final 18 minutes of the game, including overtime.
“It’s about three games in the making,” Nurse said of the lineup. “I’ve been talking about doing it and getting to it for a long time, and I just had never found that or pulled the trigger until we got way down the other night. It just gives us a little bit better chance to guard them. That’s the main thing.”
Offensively, it seemed to work at times as the Raptors drew the Celtic defenders outside the paint, and while it worked on to stop Boston’s perimeter play, it created some problems on the interior where Daniel Theis roamed.
Earlier in the game Nurse went to a similar look, one he had not used a single time all season. He opted for a Lowry, Matt Thomas, Powell, Siakam, and Anunoby lineup that helped the Raptors pull to within two just before the end of the first half.
Out of halftime, the Celtics jumped ahead until VanVleet took over with a personal 9-0 run that included a six-point possession when Smart flagrantly fouled him on a 3-point shot, allowing him to convert all three free throws then nail a 3-pointer on the subsequent possession.
“That was a little spark for me to get me going after a crappy first half,” said VanVleet who followed up a four-point first half with 17 points after halftime. “So that was big for us in the third, have a little burst there to give us a lead and just kind of change the flow of the game.”
Now the Raptors will have one day off to recover from an exhausting Game 6 before they return to the court for Game 7 at 9 p.m. ET on Friday.
“At the start of the playoffs [or] even before you would have thought if Boston and Toronto got on a collision course it was going to be a hell of a series,” Nurse said. “We got a good series. We got a game 7. Let’s see what happens.”
