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When his team went up by 16 points in the fourth quarter of Game 7, a friend texted Raptors GM Masai Ujiri: "Congratulations."

From the safety of a day later, he re-enacted the scene. He held his phone up and stared at it incredulously. His head slowly pulled back in revulsion. His face sagged into a great, slack O of horror. It was at precisely that point that the Raptors began to stumble toward the finish on their figurative knees.

"Why?" Ujiri said. "Why would he do that?!"

He said it the way Brad Pitt said, "What's in the box?"

Ujiri's got his fist balled up in front of his face and he's laughing hard. But it's only funny because it worked out. Like everyone else, even Ujiri can barely believe it.

Though he's lived in Toronto for years, Ujiri said he did not fully appreciate how tight the city could get until the Indiana series.

"I have never felt anything like it," Ujiri said. He raised his hands above his head and mimed shouldering something enormous. "The weight of it."

This wasn't just the history of the Raptors, all 20-plus years of nearly uninterrupted futility. This was hockey and baseball and every other sporting disappointment that has shaped the ur-Toronto fan.

He or she is a true believer … that things will go terribly wrong and always in the most painful possible way. But given the slightest wedge into winning, he or she becomes deliriously thankful for any small crust of achievement thrown their way.

Having finally given them the city from that unlikely angle, the Raptors were a different team on Monday. Looser. No longer giving off the feel of a wrung-out dishcloth.

"The whole talk about us not being able to get out of the first round was tough on some guys," Norman Powell said. "Everybody is happier today."

Only a rookie would be gormless enough to admit it, even after the fact.

On the other end of the world-weary spectrum, 115-year-old all-star Kyle Lowry had already dropped back into combat mode.

"You said you're worried about …" a reporter began.

Lowry cut her off.

"You said 'worried?' … " – pause to stare – "I'm focused on the Heat. I'm focused on the Heat."

On the subject of beating Indiana – only the second playoff series win he's been a part of during a decade in the NBA – Lowry was deliciously blasé: "It's something we did. It's over with."

You get where he's coming from, but that doesn't wash. This was more than a step on the road to somewhere. This was passing through NBA Heaven's Gate (Toronto Entrance).

The Raptors have simultaneously closed off a long, bad chapter and opened up a whole series of possibilities.

We could move immediately to obsessing about the matchups, but it is important to first note that the Raptors cannot lose to Miami. Even if they're defeated.

Given how low they were, they've exceeded expectations.

If they lose – as long as it's not a grim surrender – fans and assorted bandwagon jumpers will congratulate them on a success. Ujiri can tick this season off his to-do list. It's been done.

Now he's free to begin fresh. Coach Dwane Casey gets an extension. DeMar DeRozan signs a max deal. The core remains intact (unless Ujiri decides that their value is so high, it's time to sell).

Regardless, there is no pressure to do anything drastic. In fact, it'll work the opposite way. As with the Toronto Blue Jays, there will be huge, pre-emptively nostalgic pull toward letting Lowry, DeRozan et al try it together one more time.

If the Raptors beat Miami, then it will get kooky. Arms linked in the streets. Streetcar singalongs. General euphoria.

None of us can prepare ourselves for the Twilight Zone feeling of winning two postseason series. It hasn't been done by one of Toronto's major-league teams since 2002.

Back then, you had a flip phone and it took 15 minutes to type out anything. So you didn't send bone-headed texts that acted like voodoo curses. It was a better time.

When you stop to think about winning two, it forces you to consider the fact that other cities win in the playoffs regularly. Sometimes every year. Sometimes in multiple sports.

How do they manage that? Psychologically? Does it get boring after a while? Are they all, like, "Sorry, mom, I'm going to skip the championship parade. I'm still tired from the last one."?

You can imagine yourself getting to a pretty smug and insufferable place. (The exact geographic and emotional location of that spot is called Boston.)

There's no risk of that happening in Toronto. Not right now, at least. This is still the period of profound adjustment.

The past eight months have been the most perfect time in a generation to care about sports in this city. All at once, the teams began doing smart things. More important, they stopped doing incredibly stupid ones.

It's created a disorienting sense of equilibrium.

For years, being a Toronto sports fan was a little like standing on the deck of a rolling boat. After a while, you learn how to keep your balance through the storms. Even when the ship hits the rocks. Repeatedly.

But what happens when the waters calm? How do you negotiate that headspace? For the next while, watching people react to the teams may be as interesting as watching the teams themselves. What is going to change?

"It's going to be a different theme, a different story. It will be totally different than it was against Indiana," Casey said Monday.

He was talking about basketball. He might have meant much more.

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