The Toronto Raptors got a great win at home last night against a rolling San Antonio Spurs team. They did it despite being shorthanded, with great coaching, great shooting, and small-ball.
Wednesday night’s game against the Toronto Raptors was a fascinating matchup, as it presented the San Antonio Spurs with the strategic problem it will face time and time again this season: how to play against small-ball teams.
The Raptors have embraced the small-ball craze this season, playing with a lone big, a stretch-4, and often with the effective dual point guard lineup of Kyle Lowry and former Spur Cory Joseph.
Despite missing two starters in Jonas Valanciunas and DeMarre Carroll, the Raptors stuck to their small-ball mentality, using Luis Scola, Patrick Patterson and Bismack Biyombo in various frontcourt combinations throughout the game. Scola was especially impressive, a +16 for the game, as the fulcrum of the Raptors’ small-ball attack.
The Spurs’ starting unit features two traditional big men in Tim Duncan and LaMarcus Aldridge, which has been excellent defensively this season, but relatively poor on offense, where there are growing pains in finding the best way to incorporate Aldridge and simultaneously giving Kawhi Leonard a larger role in the offence.
Kawhi struggled all night, apparently still suffering from a stomach bug that kept him out of the Spurs’ blowout of the Philadelphia 76ers earlier in the week. Although obviously a factor, Kawhi’s illness was not why the Raptors came away with a great home win.
By playing aggressive defensively and running in transition, the Raptors both attacked San Antonio’s defensive strength and offensive weakness. It’s a good idea to try to force turnovers against a starting Spurs unit trying to find an offensive rhythm, and the Raptors turned these moments of indecision into 17 Spurs turnovers and 22 precious points.
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By running off these turnovers and playing at a high pace, the Raptors also mitigated the elite rim protection the Spurs had with Duncan and Aldridge on the floor, getting up the floor before the league-best Spurs defense was set and the slower big men could get back.
It was notable how even off Spurs misses the Raptors would push the ball up the court quickly, something made easier with their two point guard lineup, and look for either Scola or Patterson in the corners. Those two were excellent running the floor all night. The Spurs’ defense prioritizes taking away the corner three, and was quick to close out on these Scola/Patterson spot ups. This duo did a great job pump faking and attacking the rim from the corner.
With the defense not set and over-extended on this early closeout, Scola/Patterson could attack the space at the rim that they created by being in the corner, and either get a high percentage shot or kick the ball out to another shooter. It was a clever tactic by head coach Dwayne Casey to turn a defensive tendency of the Spurs from a strength into a potential weakness.
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As well as prioritizing the prevention of corner threes, the Spurs prioritize protecting the rim, leaving the midrange area unprotected by design. Wing throwback DeMar DeRozan is a good midrange shooter and a bad three-point shooter, and was a super efficient 10-of-15 in the game, predominantly from midrange jump shots the defense gave him.
You don’t want to give up the shot the offense wants, and the Spurs would have been better served adjusting their defensive attitude to DeRozan and turning him into a three-point shooter.
The irony for the Spurs is that they can match up well playing small-ball. When Spurs head coach Gregg Popovich went to the bench as the starting unit struggled in the first quarter, the offensive contrast was blatant and the results immediate.
Down by 11 points with 4:48 left in the first frame, Patty Mills, Manu Ginobili, Kyle Anderson, Boris Diaw and David West strung together six crisp and quick passes with only a handful of dribbles in their first possession on the floor together, resulting in a Ginobili layup.
A couple of possessions later with 3:06 remaining, the same lineup — except with Jonathan Simmons in for Anderson — got another easy layup, this time with Diaw being the recipient after seven probing passes. Diaw is an excellent small-ball 4, with great vision, a serviceable three-point shot, and a beautiful derriere-dominant old man post game.
He is generally a positive mismatch at the 4-spot, and good things tend to happen offensively when he is featured there.
The Spurs’ small-ball bench mob cut the lead from 11 to six in just under five minutes on the floor to close the first quarter, but it took the Spurs until the fourth quarter to admit defeat and shelf the Duncan/Aldridge duo. With Duncan sitting the whole fourth quarter, the Spurs outscored the Raptors 32 to 24.
It wasn’t quite enough to get the win, but it gave the Spurs a glimpse of what could be the best long-term answer to the small-ball conundrum; Aldridge at the 5, without Duncan.
The traditional Duncan/Aldridge pairing is dynamite defensively, and should be used without question against other traditional frontlines like Memphis and Utah. But these teams are a dying breed, and while it can be deployed selectively against small-ball teams when you can leverage that size into offensive rebounds, easy points in the paint and rim protection, Popovich should actively develop small-ball units centered around Aldridge as the lone big.
Duncan could do with the rest anyway, and nobody is more aware of the fact that the regular season is preparation for the postseason than Popovich. The Spurs should be preparing for facing the ultimate small-ball test in the undefeated Golden State Warriors — a team that isn’t going away.
Even if you can figure out how to challenge the Warriors with both Duncan and Aldridge on the floor this year, something that seems increasingly unlikely, why bother?
Kawhi Leonard and LaMarcus Aldridge are going to be battling the seemingly unsolvable Stephen Curry and Draymond Green spread pick-and-roll for the next five years. They are going to have to figure this out, without Duncan, who almost certainly will not play basketball for eternity (probably).
Why not start staggering Aldridge’s and Duncan’s minutes now to start this process, playing the defensive unit selectively when the matchups dictate, but defaulting towards separating the two traditional big men?
Maybe take a leaf out of coach Rick Carlisle’s playbook in Dallas with Dirk Nowitzki, and sub Aldridge out early in order to reinsert him with the second unit. Such separation would also allow Popovich to experiment with the idea of Leonard at the 4, an intriguing option and potential nightmare matchup for opponents.
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Three of the Spurs’ five losses this season have come against small-ball teams: the Washington Wizards, New Orleans Pelicans, and now Toronto Raptors. Talented teams, but not the Warriors, who aren’t going anywhere fast. A change of strategy now might be the best decision in both the short-term and long-term for the Spurs.