Raptors outworked and outclassed by visiting Detroit Pistons

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Outworked, outplayed, outclassed. That’s how one would sum up the Toronto Raptors on Wednesday night. The Eastern Conference-leading Detroit Pistons came to town a bit short-handed, but it rarely showed, especially in a one-sided first half that saw the Pistons take a 15-point lead into the break thanks to dominance on the glass and much better shooting.

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Superstar Pistons point guard Cade Cunningham dominated, scoring 28 points in three quarters (he wasn’t needed for the fourth). Unlikely starter Paul Reed added 22, and the team shot over 50% from the field for much of the game on the way to an easy 113-95 win.

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The Raptors struggled to rebound or defend and got out-hustled in a disappointing performance that saw them trail by 20 points after three.

Scottie Barnes played solidly, but got little support from his teammates.

“I think they just outworked and outclassed us a little bit tonight,” said Jakob Poeltl, echoing our assessment.

Some takeaways from a dud of a game for the Raptors:

RETURN OF THE JAK

Toronto’s full starting lineup was available for just the 13th time all season with the return of Poeltl after a 25-game absence and the first time since Nov. 21. Poeltl was under a minutes restriction, but the team wanted him back in any capacity even though this was the last game before the NBA’s all-star break.

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Poeltl said he wasn’t going to play any differently compared to if he didn’t have any restrictions.

“I think these first couple of games I’m just going to try to play as free as possible, try to not focus on any of the back stuff that’s been going on,” Poeltl had said after practice this week. “Just try to go out there and play my game and I think the rest will come naturally.”

Raptors head coach Darko Rajakovic had likened getting Poeltl back to having “a new toy to play with,” saying it almost feels like the Raptors got a new player on the team. “But he’s gonna need live action, and to be with his teammates on the court, find his rhythm and also to help his teammates,” Rajakovic had cautioned.

Sure enough, Poeltl’s pace wasn’t quite there early on when Detroit piled on the points with him on the court. Poeltl did set a great screen that led to a basket for him off a good roll to the basket and later scored another but the rust showed again when he mistimed a pass to Barrett that ended up going out of bounds.

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Poeltl fared better in the second half and finished with nine points and six rebounds in 20 minutes. Toronto was only -2 in those minutes.

The team fell to 9-4 with its top five-man group available.

PHYSICALITY AN ISSUE

One of the few negative things you can say about this overachieving Raptors team is that they have consistently underperformed against top opponents. The loss dropped them to 11-16 against teams .500 or above and an ugly 0-7 against Detroit, Boston and New York (they’re 3-0 against Cleveland and 2-2 against Philadelphia, the other two teams in the East’s Top 6).

Matching the physicality of that group has been a struggle and few teams are as physical as the Pistons.

“There are different ways of physicality. … Our physicality is not really based on muscle and size, which we don’t have a lot of that, but our physicality is more based on our activity and us being in right spots and us covering for each other,” Rajakovic had said when asked if his team was physical enough.

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“It’s kind of like team aspect of it. And lot of those most physical teams, they do a really good job on ball screens and the grabbing and holding and making it hard to execute and run your offence,” he said.

Rajakovic said the best teams have countered the Raptors with physicality as well as by denying their opportunities to get out and run since they thrive in the open court.

It’s not like the Raptors players aren’t aware of what’s happened so far against more physical sides.

“You gotta think about what would you do if you were playing against the Raptors,” said Brandon Ingram. “What has caused us less success and I’d imagine they’re going to come in and be super physical,” he had said.

“Those guys are No. 1 from the start of the season to now so we’ll see what a really, really good team looks like.”

And that they did.

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UNEXPECTED CONTRIBUTOR

Much of the pre-game talk was about the suspensions handed out to Pistons all-star centre Jalen Duren (two games) and his backup Isaiah Stewart (seven), but the team’s third-stringer came to play in this one. Reed, who had been averaging only 12.2 minutes per game, hit his first six shots for 13 quick points. He’d only scored more in an entire game once all season.

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The unexpected scoring spree was one of the reasons Poeltl was taken out after only four minutes. Toronto opted for the more athletic Trayce Jackson-Davis, who had become just the fifth Raptor to notch a double-double in his debut with the team Sunday and the first since Kawhi Leonard.

Reed also added a monster block on a Jamal Shead layup attempt.

All before the first quarter was over.

He kept going, scoring on nine of his 10 attempts in the paint in all, along with a make on his only three-point shot, before finally cooling off.

Detroit will head into the break as one of only two teams with 40 wins so far (defending champion Oklahoma City is the other) and depth is part of the reason why, as Reed helped illustrate on Wednesday.

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