The Raptors Got Punked by the Cavs in Game 1

The Cleveland Cavaliers came out swinging against the Toronto Raptors in their second-round series opener on Monday, and if that is to be taken as a sign of respect, it’s about the only one they flashed that night. The defending champions stormed out of the gate with a pair of early 10-0 runs in Game 1, quickly building a lead that would swell to as many as 25 points and appeared, for large stretches of the game, insurmountable. The 116-105 final belies the flow and feel of the evening, and while after the game Raptors head coach Dwane Casey refused to concede that the word “dominate” was appropriate here, it was.

The Raptors knew to expect an opening salvo like this. For the second series in a row, they talked up the need to come out with force and energy, meet an opponent’s intensity, and avoid being ambushed. Never mind that anticipating an ambush renders an ambush not an ambush, the Raptors don’t have the excuse of having been surprised at any of these turns. Getting behind 10-3 in a blink and 38-20 early in the second almost seems rote at this point, in this situation.

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This was exactly the type of start the Raptors couldn’t let the Cavaliers have. In the days leading up to tip-off, Cleveland head coach Tyronn Lue talked about a potential “adjustment period” for his team as they shook out of the doldrums of an eight-day break, figured out how a new-look Raptors defense would approach them, and slowed down to find out—and take—what that defense might give them.

“No, I don’t change my approach,” LeBron James said at shootaround. “I do understand that we’ve been out for eight days and that’s a long layoff for anybody. There’s only so much rest you can get. Coach said the first six minutes is a huge, important (part) of the game, so we have to understand that. We have to play with intensity. Our fans are excited about this, they haven’t seen a game since Game 2, so we should be excited about it as well.”

Not only did the Cavaliers meet the excitement level of their fans at Quicken Loans Arena, they gave them cause for frenzy almost immediately. Less than three minutes into the game, James and Kyrie Irving converged on Kyle Lowry to force a turnover, then ran the floor, with Irving throwing an alley-oop to James off the backboard. Seriously. Three minutes into a second-round playoff game, the Cavaliers were going off-window for dunks.

“That’s who they are. They play with that flair, I didn’t feel that way,” Casey said when asked if the Raptors got punked early. “I don’t pay attention to that. I think disrespect, you get that back by out-working them and out-playing them.”

If the message wasn’t clear before Round 2, when the Cavaliers laughed on Snapchat during Game 6 of the Raptors-Milwaukee Bucks series, it was flashing in neon shortly after the game began: the Cavaliers aren’t sweating anybody in the Eastern Conference. The team has remained so steadfastly confident in their ability to push their play to another level when it matters that James and Irving are basically using “flip the switch” as a marketing mantra. This is a team that has lost just four games in Eastern Conference playoff play since James returned, and while two of those losses were to the Raptors last year, that series was not particularly worrisome for Cleveland. James famously said so before Game 5, with the series knotted 2-2. Toronto has spent a year chasing the gap between the two teams, focused on their eventual rematch, while the Cavaliers, in their best Don Draper, haven’t thought of the Raptors at all.

And so Monday seemed fun for Cleveland, their players easing back into form and celebrating at every turn. Shortly after James’ backboard dunk, Kevin Love hit a three through contact, leading J.R. Smith to sprint across the court for a leaping shoulder-check that momentarily looked like it hurt Love. From there, momentum grew, and even when the Raptors cut an 18-point lead to two in the second quarter, it took barely a minute for Cleveland to push it back to double-digits.

“Defensively, we let them get out, we let them get going,” DeMar DeRozan said after the game. “Once you let them see the basketball go in, it’s kind of contagious for them. That’s what happened tonight.”

To Toronto’s credit, they hung around enough to make things a little annoying. The Raptors shot the ball fairly well and wouldn’t throw in the towel until late in the fourth, and so James wound up playing 41 minutes. The Cavaliers were hesitant to go away from James, resting him for just three minutes outside of garbage time, a decent indication that Cleveland was at least taking the game seriously, even if they weren’t exactly conveying concern.

Yes, even if at one point after getting fouled in transition James grabbed a beer and feigned taking a sip while Smith’s eyes widened and you could almost hear him thinking about the best time to take his shirt off. Again: Seriously, James was some concern for carbs and a thirst for anti-oxidants away from drinking on the job.

“I was just in the moment. I don’t plan for things like that,” James said. “I’m not a beer guy. If she’d had a red wine, I would have probably taken a sip.”

You could call the entire experience for the Raptors a bit … sobering.

There was optimism entering the series that the Raptors were better suited to take on this challenge than they were a year ago, and that remains true. The Raptors were also deferential to James’ dominance and the Cavaliers’ standing as defending champs leading up to the series. That type of honesty is appreciated, and being realistic is important, but that attitude can’t carry over and onto the court. And yet, until very late in Monday’s game, the Raptors’ play felt deferential to the Cavs. Sure, the Raptors thrive playing from behind for whatever reasons, but this is not the team nor the time to stick your jaw out against and wait to receive the first punch.

“They did a couple of those plays early and they get their blood flowing,” P.J. Tucker said. “Those are the plays we’ve gotta eliminate.”

Those plays continued until the final buzzer, and it was toward the end that the Raptors finally took exception. Dahntay Jones, of all people, threw down a dunk with the shot clock off after the Raptors trapped, something that violates the unwritten rules, or whatever. Beyond running up the score, though, Jones claims that he told Norman Powell “you better not jump” as he approached. Ultimately, that resulted in both players arguing and receiving matching technical fouls, then Jones receiving a second and earning an ejection.

This all occurred too late to turn the tides, and wound up being just another opportunity for the Cavs to dunk on the Raptors (metaphorically, at least, although the impact is somewhere around Iman Shumpert-on-Serge Ibaka still). The focus of the Cavs’ post-game media availability was not on the challenges the Raptors presented, a tough battle, a mutual respect, or anything like that. Rather, for the second time in two postseason series, it centered on James joking about covering Jones’ fine—one that will eat two-thirds of his earnings for the season. Most damning of all, there were hints of pity in James’ voice.

“I said I was going to pay the fine before I even knew what it was. It didn’t matter,” James said. “And I told him tonight, I said, ‘Listen, Dahntay, now enough is enough. Stop getting kicked out against Toronto all the time. I’m going to stop paying your damn fines.’ But yeah, he don’t have to worry about it. He’s good.”

For all the fun the Cavaliers seemed to have, beneath the surface they are surely aware that this series is anything but over. A year ago, they won their first two home games by margins of 19 and 31, but the resilient Raptors managed to take the next two back in Toronto. This Raptors team is a better one. Despite the ugliness of Monday’s game, Toronto did some things well and can build off them—and they will, based on history and, you know, how competitive, grown-ass people tend to respond to situations like this. (It seems unlikely that Tucker has ceased talking to anyone within earshot in his low, seething grumble since the game ended.)

“We won’t relax,” Lue said. “We know what this team is capable of.”

“We’ll respond,” DeMarre Carroll promised.

The Raptors have said such things before, just like they said they wouldn’t come out and be “ambushed” in Game 1. By definition, they weren’t ambushed, but you can pick your own descriptor for that performance: dominated, trolled, punked, clowned, disrespected. The Cavs were throwing off-glass alley-oops in the opening minutes, doing their best Stone Cold by the fourth quarter, and closing out with Dahntay “56 Minutes of Playing Time Over the Last Two Seasons” Jones, of all people, rubbing it in their faces.

The Cavaliers aren’t going to change their tone or approach until the Raptors force it. If Game 1 doesn’t bring that out of the Raptors for Wednesday, they not only risk getting run off the floor again; they risk this series running away from them.