TORONTO — The Toronto Raptors outlasted the Cleveland Cavaliers in Game 4 on Sunday despite shooting 4-for-30 (13.3%) from 3-point range, the lowest 3-point shooting percentage with at least 25 attempts in a playoff win in NBA history.
“We just never flinched; we continued guarding and guarding,” Raptors coach Darko Rajaković said after the 93-89 win. “I told our guys at halftime, it’s awesome, we’re shooting 27% from the field and 15% from the 3-point line. And I was lying. I told them that we’re going to shoot better in the second half. We did not.
“But whatever it takes, just find a way to win the game.”
Offense was difficult to come by for both teams on Sunday. Toronto shot 32% from the field overall; Cleveland shot 37%.
But the Raptors were missing even when they were wide open. According to ESPN Research, they shot 2-of-21 on open 3-pointers, the worst mark by any team in a playoff game since ESPN began tracking in 2014 (min. 20 attempts).
“We all communicated with each other, just keep shooting,” said Raptors forward Brandon Ingram, who made three of Toronto’s four 3s, including its only made 3 in the second half. “We’re getting good looks. Not only 3s, we missed some layups. We missed a lot of open looks.
“Just told each other to keep shooting. It’s only going to happen on defense. You got to play defense and come back down on the other end and still have an opportunity.”
Ingram and Scottie Barnes both finished with 23 points, outscoring the Cavaliers’ star duo of Donovan Mitchell (20 points) and James Harden (19 points).
The Raptors won both games in Toronto to tie the series at 2. Game 5 is Wednesday in Cleveland.
Several teammates credited Barnes for his leadership and remaining steady when the team fell behind 2-0, beginning in the locker room after Game 2 in Cleveland.
“‘We good, fellas. We know what we need to do,'” Garrett Temple recalled Barnes telling the team that night. “He actually, in his mind, envisioned what we need to do to win the game. And you can feel that. You can feel when it’s fake and somebody’s just trying to keep you up. And you can feel when he really believes that we have found something that we can do to win.”
And Barnes has followed it up with two of the best performances of his career. After scoring 33 points in Game 3, he led all scorers again on Sunday while playing stellar defense. Barnes was the primary defender on Mitchell, who shot 1-for-8 with Barnes defending him. Overall, the Cavs were just 3-for-12 when Barnes contested a shot.
“Scotty right now, the way he’s playing, he’s at 60% of a player that he’s going to be in two, three years,” Rajaković said. “Scotty’s going to be one of the best players in the league. He’s already one of the best players in the league, but how much he cares about winning, it’s pushing him forward to do whatever it takes to win the game. That’s what makes him so special.”
Cleveland, meanwhile, will go home searching for answers after a pair of rough shooting performances from Harden and Mitchell, who combined for 11 turnovers in Game 4. Harden had more turnovers (seven) than field goals (six). On Sunday, the Raptors contested 26 of Mitchell’s and Harden’s 38 shot attempts, and the duo combined to shoot just 6-of-26 (23%) on those attempts.
“Guys got to be aggressive,” Harden said. “It’s time for us to make an adjustment in the sense of just being aggressive. Getting to the basket and taking shots and opportunity when we have them.
“A low-scoring game today. Feels like nobody could really get it going, but it’s an opportunity for us to tighten up on the little things. Closing the quarters well, even when we’re not shooting the basketball, limiting second-chance points, things like that. The things that you can control in order to prevail you to win, even when you’re not shooting the ball well.”
Both Harden and Mitchell agreed that these two games in Toronto represented a missed opportunity. After the Cavs dominated the first two games in Cleveland, the series now becomes a best-of-three.
Still, the Cavaliers remain confident in themselves going back home.
“The biggest thing is the mentality,” Mitchell said. “We weren’t making shots, and our defense held true. That takes a lot for a group to have open look after open look, not having your head down.
“And the next part of that challenge and that mental is just coming back and handling business at the crib. That’s really it. Not sitting here with our heads down. They did their job. We did our job. Now we got to go back and do our job again. Simple as that.”
