The eventual outcome of some NBA games are relatively easy to understand, as there are 1 or 2 simplistic statistical categories (which the league chooses to record) that just jump right out and tell much of the game story, when you look at the boxscore after it’s complete.
This was one of those games.
As was outlined yesterday … Battle by the Bay … if the Raptors hoped to steal the 2nd game on their 5-games-in-7-nights road-trip, what they absolutely had to do was come out on top in the ‘Battle of the Boards’ vs the #30 team (-4.7 per game), in the NBA, in terms of Rebounding Differential.
Alas, when Toronto failed, in this regard (see the Boxscore), in addition to coming up short in Turnovers & Steals, there was no way for this team – minus Chris Bosh (who might otherwise have been able to save them by getting to the FT line, at his usual pace) – to outscore the Warriors, even though these two teams match-up fairly evenly in terms of their player personnel.
When you play the worst rebounding team in the league and you lose the ‘Battle of the Boards’ … your team is probably going to lose the game, as well … it’s as simple as that.
Khandor's Sports Blog 
March 13, 2008 at 8:00 pm |
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March 13, 2008 at 8:58 pm |
They had 2 more rebounds than us, rebounding is hardly the reason we lost IMHO. I thought the ability of Ellis and Baron to create space off the dribble for open mid-range jumpers did us in, I don’t even remember how many of those Baron hit in the fourth quarter.
We got killed in fastbreak points and perimeter D, nothing new really. I thought the reason we stayed in this game is our rebounding and high FG%.
March 13, 2008 at 9:30 pm |
Arsenalist,
Only -2 Rebounds!
When you play against a team like Golden State, sometimes it’s about establishing a style of play that is not compatible with the type of game the Warriors want to impose on your team.
Understand that this is a team that is last in the NBA in Rebounding Differential (-4.76).
Meaning that, if the Raptors performanced at the level of an ‘average’ NBA team against the Warriors, during last night’s game, they should have been able to collect approximately +5 more rebounds than Golden State.
Instead of accomplishing this minimum objective, Toronto finished -2 in this category, in what was a ‘2-possession’ game with 40 seconds left in the 4th Quarter.
If the Raptors had been able to convert that -2 into a +5 (i.e. a Rebounding Differential Effect of +7) … earlier in the game (e.g. during the first 6 minutes of the 4th Quarter) … How different do you think those last few possessions would have been coming the stretch of last night’s game?
Establishing a minimum level of ‘physicality’ when playing against the Warriors … would have changed the entire tone of last night’s match-up.
March 13, 2008 at 11:06 pm |
[…] khandor wrote a fantastic post today on “Raptors @ Warriors … post mortem”Here’s ONLY a quick extractAlas, when Toronto failed, in this regard (see the Boxscore), in addition to coming up short in Turnovers & Steals, there was no way for this team – minus Chris Bosh (who might have been able to save them by getting to the FT line, … […]