Toronto Raptors guard Kyle Lowry and Minnesota Timberwolves forward Andrew Wiggins eye the play at the Air Canada Centre Tuesday.Christopher Katsarov/The Canadian Press
After a first half their coach called 'soft as tissue,' the Toronto Raptors seized control late in the night and toppled the Minnesota Timberwolves in a tense one, 109-104.
The Raptors avoided a second straight loss at the hands of the Timberwolves, with DeMar DeRozan's 23 points and eight assists leading the way. Kyle Lowry added 15 points and nine assists, while Serge Ibaka had 15, and Jonas Valanciunas contributed another double-double – 18 points and 11 rebounds.
Jimmy Butler tallied 25 points for Minnesota while Canada's own Andrew Wiggins had 15.
The Raptors have now beat the Timberwolves 14 straight times in Toronto, a franchise record for consecutive wins over a single opponent.
Minnesota came to town with a 32-21 record, sitting fourth in the West behind Golden State, Houston and San Antonio. They were stinging from a 105-100 loss in Atlanta the night before and set to play their fifth game in seven nights.
Yet it was the Raptors -- who last played Sunday at home – that looked sluggish in the first quarter. They made just eight of their 23 field-goal attempts, including seven misses from DeRozan.
Wiggins was visiting his hometown, now in his fourth NBA season and averaging 18 points per game, slightly less than in his past two seasons. The 2014 first overall draft was averaging 25.3 points per game against Toronto coming into Tuesday, his second-highest against any single NBA opponent, and had put up 29 while beating the Raptors in Minneapolis just 10 days earlier.
"His aggressiveness, especially coming in this building," said DeRozan of Wiggins before the game, asked what he's noticed most about the Canadian when he plays at Air Canada Centre. "Anytime anybody gohome and play, you want to leave a statement, but we can't allow that to happen. We've got to be physical from the start, not watch guys take a few shots to see if they're hot or not."
However, the 22-year-old Canadian struggled to start Tuesday, missing his first six shots before draining a couple bank shots late in the quarter. His Timberwolves led the Raptors 27-19 at the end of the first.
It wasn't Wiggins leading the way, nor Karl-Anthony Towns, but reserve big man Gorgui Dieng, making his first six attempts for 14 points and blocking two shots in just 11 minutes. Butler, making his first appearance in Toronto in a Minnesota uniform, scored 12 points by the half, while Toronto's star back court of Lowry and DeRozan were 3-of-13.
The Raptors allowed them to shoot a whopping 59 per cent and trailed 57-51 at the half.
"We were soft as tissue," was how Toronto Coach Dwane Casey described his team's performance to that point. They got a talking-to at half-time.
Toronto was without C.J Miles, who was sidelined with a sore right knee, causing the team to call more on Norman Powell. The Raps did have Fred Van Vleet in uniform, a day after welcoming his first child, a daughter. He missed Monday's practice and Tuesday morning's shoot-around, and made it to the game about an hour before tip-off on just a couple of hours sleep. He would go on to deliver a 10-point performance.
DeRozan and Lowry were locked in to start the second half. DeRozan sunk four of his first five shots and made an incredible sideline-save-turned-pass to Lowry, which ended in a breakaway layup and put the Raptors within one late in the third. They each had 15 points going into the fourth, and Raps were down just 80-78.
Then the young Raptors reserves delivered off the bench early in the fourth to carry Toronto into the lead. There was a windmill dunk and some timely buckets from Powell – showing shades of the Powell who has, for a while, been missing – and dominance in the paint from Jakob Poeltl. Powell would finish the night with eight points, and Poeltl 12.
The Raptors built that lead to as much as nine, and the Timberwolves rallied at one point back to within two – thanks to a Wiggins three. But they couldn't reclaim the lead.
The Raptors had 28 assists in the win. Now through just 49 games, the Raptors have already surpassed last season's total of 34 games with 20-plus assists.
The Raptors improve to 34-15, wrapping up the three-game home stand. They now head to Washington for a Thursday night contest with the Wizards before returning home to play the very next night against the Portland Trailblazers.
Rachel Brady