Raptors get back to playoffs, will face Cleveland Cavaliers

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The Toronto Raptors are heading back to the NBA playoffs.

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It’s been a while, but an easy 136-101 win against a Brooklyn Nets team fielding nothing close to a legitimate NBA roster for the regular-season finale got Toronto back in for the first time since 2021-22.

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The Raptors improved to 46 wins, 16 more than last season, but had to wait a few minutes to find out who they’d be facing as Boston versus Orlando went right down to the wire.

RJ Barrett led Toronto with 26 points, Brandon Ingram added 25 and Scottie Barnes had an 18-point, 12-rebound, 12-assist triple-double.

“It’s a relief,” Barnes said afterward of returning to the post-season. “It feels great. This is what we wanted to do as a team. We got here, but we’ve still got some ways to go.”

With nothing to play for, Brooklyn held out nearly every meaningful player on it roster and finished with 20 wins. The Nets are desperate for some lottery luck.

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AN OLD FOE IS NEXT

The Raptors have faced only 11 different teams in the playoffs, but will now run into the Cleveland Cavaliers for a fourth time.

Toronto’s win, along with an Atlanta loss in Miami and an Orlando collapse against a Boston team resting all of its best players, meant that instead of the most likely scenario — Toronto facing the New York Knicks for a third time —  it’s another series with Cleveland.

This time, there will be no LeBron James, Kyle Lowry or DeMar DeRozan, but for the third time in four meetings, the series will kick off in Ohio.

“We just found out with Boston beating Orlando, we’re gonna be the fifth seed,” said Raptors head coach Darko Rajakovic. “Obviously we never set a goal of get this seed or that seed. We were just focussing on our work, focussing on the things that were in our control.

“We saw a lot of growth from this roster. The best part of it is that we’re gonna have an opportunity to play in the playoffs. As much as all of those games meant to put us in the playoffs, it’s going to be an amazing experience for our team to go in the playoffs. We’re just gonna take it one game as a time. Our mentality is not gonna change. We’re gonna try to win one game, this next game, and see where we end up.”

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Toronto fell to James and Cleveland in three straight years, 2016, 2017 and 2018, before James left for the Los Angeles Lakers.

The Cavs have made many changes since, including blockbuster trades for Donovan Mitchell and, this year, James Harden, as well as drafting big man Evan Mobley one pick before Toronto selected Barnes in 2021.

The Raptors beat Cleveland all three times they played this season, though that was before Harden got there. While a formidable foe, this is a much better matchup on paper for the Raptors, who have been torched by Knicks stars Jalen Brunson and Karl-Anthony Towns, and have lost 13 straight to New York.

Meanwhile, Mitchell shot a season low against any opponent — 34.2% — from the field in two meetings with the Raptors this season, while Harden went just 10-for-27 in his game with the Clippers against Toronto (but still dominated late to win the game).

Still Barnes, Rajakovic and other Raptors cautioned Cleveland will be a handful.

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“Amazing team, amazing coach, they’re (in fourth place) for a reason,” Rajakovic said.

“Everybody thinks they’re one of the contenders and I agree with that. They’re loaded. They made good decisions at trade deadline with James (Harden) going to that team. I think they have a lot of weapons and I think it’s going to be an amazing opportunity for us. I think we’re going to really improve through that series, and we’re going to try to do our best to win every single game.”

The Raptors would have finished sixth and faced New York had Atlanta beaten Miami, but the Hawks opted to rest many key players.

FINISHING WITH STYLE

Barnes closed out the regular season in style, picking up his ninth career triple-double. That leaves him seven behind Kyle Lowry’s franchise record. It’s the third for Barnes this year, tying Lowry for second-most triple-doubles in a season by a Raptor, one off the high Barnes set in 2023-24.

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Barnes looked like the best player on the floor, and nobody on Brooklyn had any answers for him.

That was also the case for trying to deal with Jakob Poeltl.

Playing against an overmatched, under-experienced and undersized group of Nets, Toronto’s centre pretty much did what he wanted on offence. The big man was a load down low, a good sign considering he’d been off and on recently.

Afterward he said he was thrilled to get back to the playoffs after a long absence.

SHEAD THE IRON MAN

When the Raptors drafted Jamal Shead out of Houston in the second round in 2024, the franchise knew it was getting a solid character player who would always give his all. Shead was the reigning NCAA defensive player of the year, the Big 12 player of the year and defensive player of the year, and the second-winningest player in Cougars history. He was also one of the most durable competitors in college basketball, setting a school record with 38 games played as a sophomore before not missing a single contest in either of the next two years.

Shead played 10 more games (75) than any other Raptor last season, and this time around he suited up for all 82, two more than Barnes and Sandro Mamukelashvili. Nobody had played 82 games for Toronto since Poeltl in his rookie campaign in 2017-18. Shead becomes just the 17th of 308 all-time Raptors to achieve the feat (Morris Peterson did it four times, Alvin Williams and DeMar DeRozan twice each).

Barnes and Mamukelashvili set new career highs for games played, while Ingram only played more in his rookie season. Quickley played at least 70 for only the third time in six seasons.

@WolstatSun

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