NBA Finals vs. Golden State, Game 1

Raptors 118, Warriors 109 May 30, 2019 • Toronto, Ontario

Northern Touch

Raptors Give Warriors Rude Welcoming, Win First Ever Finals Game

By Sean Woodley

Game 1 of the NBA Finals ... in Toronto. What a scene.

Twenty-four years of tension, built up by departed stars and inferiority complexes and a half decade-straight of crushing conclusions to otherwise great seasons, all released in one beautiful, uproarious day. Fans lined up more than 12 hours ahead of the first Finals game in Raptors history just for the chance to watch the game in the famed outdoor haven for priced-out fans, Jurassic Park. Many of those old estranged stars, including Chris Bosh, Tracy McGrady, and Damon Stoudamire were in an attendance, and honoured by the team to boot. Vindication was afoot, everywhere. It was worth every second of the 24 year wait.

Though amidst the excitement and the newness was a touch of realism. Underneath the euphoric haze that hung above Toronto between Game 6 against Milwaukee and the Finals opener, the scent of gravy could be detected. Toronto simply surviving the Eastern Conference blood wars and making the Finals felt like enough to satiate most Raptors fans. Beating the Warriors would have been amazing, sure. It also would have been crazy to outright expect it.

Even without the injured Kevin Durant, sidelined with a calf injury since late in the second round, the Warriors were The Champs. Portland entered the Western Conference Finals feeling themselves after an emotional Game 7 win over Denver. Four games later, they'd been snuffed out by the Warriors machine. Golden State had spent the last five years tossing the good vibes of opponents in the trash.

On Toronto's first offensive possession, Kyle Lowry airmailed a pass to Pascal Siakam in the right corner. Maybe Warriors-induced jitters really were a thing?

As it turned out, Lowry's gaffe would prove to be one of the only bouts of frayed nerves Toronto dealt with all night. With the help of a locked-in supporting cast, the dependability of which had fluctuated over the course of the season, Toronto weathered an 11-point, three-triple first quarter from Steph Curry to escape with a 25-21 lead.

The opening 12 minutes laid bare the all-out approach the Warriors were going to employ to bother Leonard, the MVP of the post-season to date. Toronto's superstar saw multiple bodies at the top of every pick-and-roll he ran. He ran a lot of pick-and-rolls anyway.

"They did a good job in both halves, blitzing my picks and rolls," Leonard detailed after his clean five-assist, two-turnover turn as a playmaker. "Bringing two to the ball, and if I get by that third guy's coming. But my teammates played well tonight. It's a team game, if they (the Warriors) are gonna play like that then guys are gonna play well, get wide open shots."

"Don't try to be a hero out there. Just play basketball. And that's what I do."

Kawhi having his space cramped all night meant the Warriors were always conceding something, somewhere. That something was a line of wide open first-quarter threes to Toronto's supporting cast. Beating the Warriors is all about massaging the math. Threes are worth more than twos, and no one in the history bombs triples the way Klay Thompson and Steph Curry have since the Warriors' ascent. Even though the Raptors fired up 14 triples in the first quarter, connecting on five, you could have still quibbled with a couple long balls the likes of Marc Gasol and Kyle Lowry opted to pass up.

The point though, is that those threes were available, and it was all thanks to Leonard's magnetism. Earlier in the postseason, selling out the stop Leonard might have been a usable strategy against Philadelphia or for the first couple games against the Bucks, when if the supporting cast wasn't bricking shots it was straight up passing out of them. The equation changes when Pascal Siakam, Marc Gasol, and Danny Green can swish 7-of-16 triples combined as they did in Game 1.

"It's not Kawhi Leonard. It's the Raptors." said Klay Thompson after the game in assessment of Golden State's Kawhi-focused D. Imagine hearing that back in round two.

More crucial than anyone else to Toronto's from-all-angles attack in Game 1 was Pascal Siakam. Toronto's ascendant star saw his efficiency gradually slashed over the course of the postseason, as the defenders in his grill got progressively more daunting. It speaks to how exponentially his development curve exploded in such a short time that the Sixers and Bucks assigned their best defenders — Embiid and Antetokounmpo — to the cause of slowing down Siakam. After dealing with the league's two closest things to real life Monstars, Siakam seemed positively giddy at the sight of former Defensive Player of the Year Draymond Green and his ho hum 6'7 frame.

Siakam's first quarter oozed comfortability. He attacked mismatches when they presented themselves, but was as at home driving and spinning around Green as he was against the overmatched Curry. He left the opening frame with a tidy five points, two rebounds, and three assists on his ledger. It was in the second half where Siakam really invited himself to the center of the NBA's grandest stage.

Here's a quick rundown of Siakam's exploits on a string of consecutive possessions to begin the third quarter:

• A silky spin move and a bucket around Green

• A mid-range jumper than rattled in

• A trip to the free-throw line and a pair of makes

• His fourth assist of the night on an acrobatic leap and dump off to a charging Leonard on the break

• A sublime switch out onto Klay Thompson that helped force a Warriors shot clock violation

• A driving,...