Raptors Recap; December 28 vs Pacers

Game 2- vs Pacers (L 90-85 / 1-1 / streak L1) Wednesday December 28, 2011

Background
The Pacers hit the playoffs last year as the eighth seed and played competitive basketball against the #1 ranked Chicago Bulls. After adding David West, George Hill and Lou Amundson, the Pacers look to make another playoff push. If the Raptors hope to make the playoffs they should use the Pacers as a measuring stick.
A tough, defensive-minded team that plays hard and can make the big shots, the Pacers have a strong core. The Raptors are notoriously soft, and a bruising team like Indiana is kind of the antithesis of the Raptors lineup regardless of new head coach Dwane Casey's defensive preaching.

Outcome
The Raptors looked to be out of the game at many points, but made a late-game push, only to fall short 90-85 after a couple of clutch buckets by the Pacers' Danny Granger and David West.

Key Matchup
Andrea Bargnani played well when he got to the rim (mostly on pump fakes) and when he found open jump shots, but didn't do much else. Bargnani didn't close down the lane, or close out on shooters with any type of urgency, and this may have cost the Raptors the game when David West sunk the final dagger. Bargnani only mustered 4 rebounds while his counterpart Roy Hibbert had a quiet double-double with 12 points and 10 rebounds.

Raps Review
It was a slow, gritty, sloppy, choppy game and the referees really prevented any type of momentum from building which worked against the Raptors, who would have exploded in front of a raucous home-opener crowd.
Unlike the balanced offensive attack of last game, it was Bargnani and DeRozan shouldering the load for the Raptors and they finished with 21 and 22 points respectively.
Down the stretch the Raptors lost this game because they had no clutch team defense, and were lost and out of position on their defensive rotations. The Raptors only needed to play defense for one final possession to get the ball back down 3 with a chance to tie the game, but were sunk by David West who put the game out of reach.
Jamaal Magloire played some aggressive, but at times overly excited basketball in front of his hometown crowd for the first time after soaking in his national anthem and making an impromptu speech at centre court, and finished without scoring.

Bargnani skies/tries for the rebound