In a shocking turn of events, the Toronto Raptors came back from 17 points down off of a 21-2 run to beat the Indiana Pacers 102-99 to take a 3-2 series lead!
Well, that was exciting!
For 41 minutes and 29 seconds (89 minutes and 29 seconds if you include Game 4), the Indiana Pacers held a lead against the Toronto Raptors. In Game 5, the largest deficit was 17 points. By all accounts, Toronto shouldn’t have won Game 5. Then this happened:
The Toronto Raptors, down 13 points to start the 4th quarter, opened a 21-2 run on the Pacers to comeback and take their first lead since they won Game 3! To put this in context, Indiana spent 36 minutes dominating Toronto in almost every way, scoring 90 points on 29 of 58 team shooting, 50 percent for those following along. In the 4th quarter, Indy only scored two points in the first 9 minutes to Toronto’s 21!
What made this comeback even more spectacular was the fact that coach Dwane Casey went with a lineup that he never used before or even practiced with, something not many, if any coach would do with the series on the line. That lineup consisted of Kyle Lowry, Cory Joseph, Norman Powell, Terrence Ross/DeMar DeRozan and Bismack Biyombo. This obscure small ball line up would hold Paul George and the Indiana Pacers to only 4 shots made in 15 attempts, good enough nine 4th quarter points. For more context, Paul George had torched the Raptors for 37 points in the first 3 quarters. He finished the game with 39 points, scoring only 2 in the 4th.
Make no mistake, the Pacers are a good team, which they’ve proven to the Raptors. And Paul George is the best player in the series, something that comes as no surprise. However, the Raptors are the better team. Outside of Paul George, man for man, the Raptors have more talent and better players than Indiana. And for 12 minutes in the 4th quarter on Tuesday evening, they proved it.
But Toronto isn’t out of the woods yet. There’s still at least one more game to play in this series. And Dwane Casey isn’t lost on the fact that the Raptors need to put it all together for a full 48 minutes in order to win their first series in 16 years.
"“If we don’t come in (Friday) with the mentality like we had in the fourth quarter, it’s going to be a long game.”– Dwane Casey (source)"
Toronto must bring their A-game on Friday, because Indiana will most certainly bring theirs. Toronto will have to once again show that same heart and toughness that they showed in the 4th quarter in Game 6 and fully exorcise their postseason demons once and for all.
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All stats are provided by Basketball-Reference.com unless otherwise stated. Matthew Allman is a staff writer for Raptors Rapture. For more coverage on the Toronto Raptors, follow Matthew on Twitter @ShadowRapsFan and also follow @RaptorsRapture for the latest in Raptors news.