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The Toronto Raptors’ Kyle Lowry drives for the net past Indiana Pacers players at the Air Canada Centre in Toronto on Monday.Frank Gunn/The Canadian Press

On Monday, the Toronto Raptors came out with a different plan for slowing Paul George.

Trailing the Indiana Pacers 1-0 in their best-of-seven playoff series, the Toronto Raptors went into Game 2 with DeMarre Carroll in the starting lineup for the first time since his January knee surgery. The Raptors had allowed George to explode for 33 points on Saturday, and Toronto star DeMar DeRozan bore the brunt of that defensive assignment. They needed a different strategy on the Pacers star.

In photos: Raptors take Game Two against the Pacers

Carroll, whom Toronto gave a four-year contract worth some $60-million to provide superior wing defence, shared the duties of guarding George with rookie Norman Powell on Monday. The Raptors slowed him to a slightly more conservative 28 points on 8-of-15 shooting and evened the series with a 98-87 victory.

"He probably felt us a lot more this game than he did last game," said Carroll.

Carroll missed a combined 54 games this year, most while he recovered from arthroscopic surgery on his right knee. His return to the Raptors lineup came less than two weeks ago, and he had minutes in just three games before the playoffs began. He had been limited to 20 minutes of play per night to be cautious with the knee. Plus in his absence, the Raptors had been starting Powell and had settled into a nice rotation. Disrupting those minutes too much now is risky.

So they brought Carroll off the bench in Game 1, and he didn't see much time on George.  So they re-jigged the plan.

"Somehow we've got to get DeMarre integrated into the lineup, and one way to do that is to have him start on Paul George," said Toronto Coach Dwane Casey. "That way he's not coming in when George is already heated and being asked to turn off the water."

But three minutes into the start Carroll had already drawn two fouls and Casey was waving down the bench for Powell.

"It told us how the officials were going to call the game and I thought we adjusted well after that," said Casey. "Norm filled in well. DeMarre isn't 100 percent yet – I mean his knee is fine – but his game conditioning, his timing, it's still progressing and he's got to play, that's why we need to keep working him into the lineup."

Much as he'd been asked to guard superstars like Russell Westbrook and James Harden recently, the rookie was then enlisted on George – Indy's lean and athletic star who can score from anywhere and draw the contact needed to get to the free throw line.

Before the first quarter was through, George had committed two fouls himself. He came out of the game with just three points on free throws on his stat line, having missed all three of his attempts from the field.

George returned a few minutes into the second quarter and so did Carroll. The Indiana star got active right away as Carroll chased him around with arms waving. George drew Raptors big man Jonas Valanciunas into a couple fouls in the paint to get to the free throw line. He hit a few jumpers, and nabbed some rebounds. By half-time, George had 13 points on 3-of-8 shooting.

George will score on any defender in the league, so an opponent can only hope to slow him and make him exert himself for every bucket. At one point in the third quarter, George got loose and nailed an uncontested three. Carroll promptly went down and hit his first field goal of the night, and then aggravated George so much on his next possession that he flung a pass chaotically out of bounds. Patrick Patterson had a hand in aggravating George at times. Even Kyle Lowry flustered him into mishandling once.

Before the third quarter was through, Carroll was up to four fouls and went back to the bench. Powell resumed the laborious assignment. George was up to 24 points, but Powell kept glued to the star.

Carroll didn't return once he hit the 20-minute mark. The Raps stuck with the rookie in the fourth, and George left the game with three minutes left and the game too out-of-hand for Indiana to recover.

"I thought we collectively took him out of what he wanted to do – being physical with him, bodying him, bumping him and not letting him run freely," said Powell. "He's a really difficult player to guard. He can post you up, he can take you off the dribble, he can shoot the three. It was fun. Those are the kind of players I've been wanting to guard my whole life."

The knotted series now shifts to Indianapolis for Games 3 and 4, which will be played Thursday and Saturday.

"They outworked us," said George. "I'm not going to have easy opportunities getting to the rim against this team."

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