Toronto Raptors basketball is back. Kind of.
The team’s pre-season schedule kicks off Sunday night in Montreal vs. the Washington Wizards.
The Raptors held an open practice at McGill University on Friday in front of fans and media, but did so without all-star Scottie Barnes, starting point guard Immanuel Quickley, rookie Ja’Kobe Walter, veterans Bruce Brown and Garrett Temple and all but Temple have been ruled out for Sunday, head coach Darko Rajakovic told reporters in Montreal on Saturday.
Barnes at least was back with the team Saturday after missing the week post-media day for personal reasons, but Rajakovic wants him to practice more with the team before suiting up for a game. Toronto doesn’t play again until a rematch, this time in Washington, on Friday. Quickley is dealing with a thumb issue, Walter a shoulder injury and Brown is recovering from knee surgery. Temple was excused for a personal matter, but was expected back Saturday, while rookie guard Jamal Shead took a hit in practice but was expected to play against the Wizards.
Toronto will also play on the road next Sunday, against defending NBA champion Boston, before a home rematch against the Celtics on Oct. 15, the only real “home” exhibition for the Raptors, since Sunday’s NBA Canada series game in La Belle Province is considered a home match. The pre-season concludes Oct. 18 at Brooklyn, with the opener of Season 30 going Oct. 23 against Cleveland at Scotiabank Arena.
FAMILIAR FACES
There’s a good chance Sunday’s starting centres will be very familiar with each other. Toronto’s Jakob Poeltl backed up new Wizard Jonas Valanciunas before Poeltl was dealt to the Spurs in the Kawhi Leonard deal. Valanciunas, one of the best big men in franchise history, was later dealt himself to Memphis for Marc Gasol, completing Toronto’s championship puzzle.
Valanciunas arrived from New Orleans in a sign-and-trade and inked a new three-year deal, but might not be there long. Little is expected of the Wizards this season. They are considered strong contenders to finish with the NBA’s worst record and to trade away veterans like Valanciunas, Kyle Kuzma, Malcolm Brogdon and Jordan Poole (if anyone would actually take on his contract) at some point.
Only Detroit and San Antonio have won fewer games than Washington over
the last three seasons. Head coach Brian Keefe took over in January and gets his first gig in charge of a team after 14 years as an assistant. Keefe started coaching in Oklahoma City around the same time Raptors head coach Darko Rajakovic broke into the NBA heading the Thunder’s G-League affiliate in Tulsa. When Keefe returned to the Thunder for a year in 2019-20, one of his fellow assistants was Vin Bhavnani, who is entering his second year as an assistant under Rajakovic in Toronto.
Both Keefe and Rajakovic got top jobs in large part because of their backgrounds in player development as both Toronto and Washington are in rebuilds, with the Raptors a few steps ahead of the Wizards right now.
FRED HELPING SHEAD
Fred VanVleet owes a lot to the Raptors organization and even though he now plays for the Houston Rockets, he’s still giving back. VanVleet was once in a similar situation the rookie Shead now finds himself in, an NCAA veteran known as a defensive-minded winning player needing to scrap just to make the roster. VanVleet earned the final roster spot back in the day and went on to become a key piece of the title team, an all-star, the franchise single-game scoring and assist leader and then a highly paid addition with the Rockets. Nobody expects Shead to follow VanVleet’s path exactly of course, but the franchise seems to believe in him. And VanVleet has offered his help, Shead told Sportsnet’s Michael Grange in Montreal on Friday.
“He just said ‘anything you need, hit me up,” Shead said. VanVleet knows of Shead because both played in Houston last year, with Shead winning NCAA defensive player of the year for the Cougars and leaving campus as that program’s all-time winningest player.
AROUND THE RIM
NBA Canada is holding a 12,000 foot activation called Maison NBA in Montreal this weekend. Vince Carter was scheduled to make an appearance, along with his former teammate Jerome (Junkyard Dog) Williams and Canadian women’s team icon Natalie Achonwa … Washington rosters two teenagers (No. 2 overall pick Alex Sarr and intriguing rookie point guard Bub Carrington), plus a couple of teenagers (last year’s No. 7 selection Bilal Couilbaly and Swiss-Canadian rookie Kyshawn George). This is a young group. George’s father, Deon, is from Montreal so this will be a homecoming of sorts. Deon George was a Canadian national team teammate of RJ Barrett’s dad, Rowan Barrett (and of Canadian hoops legend Steve Nash). One of Nash’s assistants in Brooklyn was Keefe, who now coaches young Kyshawn George in a fun coincidence.
@WolstatSun