Through six and a half games, the Toronto Raptors were dead even with the Cleveland Cavaliers — a team most considered to be the outright favourites in their first-round series.
Unfortunately for the Raptors, the wheels came off and the Cavaliers pulled away for a 114-102 win in Game 7, finishing the job against the underdogs and cementing their spot in Round 2 of the NBA playoffs.
So while the Raptors exceeded outside expectations and are taking pride in their run, they feel like they left some food on the table.
“Obviously, it’s frustrating because we felt like we had something, we felt like we had a chance even past this series. It felt like we could have gone on a run here,” Jakob Poeltl said on Monday at the team’s end-of-season press conference. “I mean, it comes down to one game, and I guess we just didn’t have enough yesterday… We gotta look into the future and see what we can do better next year.”
Heading into the season, having acquired a former all-star in Brandon Ingram, playoffs were the expectation. They succeeded on that end.
But as their series against the Cavaliers unfolded, with the Raptors holding serve on home court and pushing their opponents to the brink, expectations within the locker room grew and the goal posts shifted for what could be considered a success.
“Successful? I don’t know about successful,” Scottie Barnes said. “But, you know, it was a good season for us. I felt like we went out there every single game and we just got better, found out more about ourselves after each and every single game, and we work really hard… It felt like we had a solid season.”
What-ifs will always hang in the air after a tight series loss.
What if Ingram had been healthy for the final three games of the series? What if Immanuel Quickley’s hamstring hadn’t flared up at the end of the season?
What if the Raptors didn’t go ice cold in the fourth quarter of Game 5, when they shot seven-for-28 from the field and two-of-12 from three?
“I think the one that hurts is Game 5. That’s the one. That was the one right there. Game 5,” RJ Barrett said of the loss. But he hopes to take it as a learning experience heading into next season, when the expectations will rightfully be higher.
“Always end goal is to win a championship. I think from where we were last year to now has been a huge, huge jump. So it’s successful in that,” Barrett added. “But also, because I think you can kind of see just the work that’s been put in and where we can go in the future. I think that the future is very bright for us, and it’s only the beginning.”
A common refrain throughout the playoffs for Toronto has been that, while outsiders might be surprised to see young guys stepping up in key situations, the players in the locker room certainly aren’t.
In the absence of Ingram and Quickley, players like Jamison Battle, Jamal Shead, Ja’Kobe Walter and Collin Murray-Boyles — all in their first or second seasons — rose to the occasion.
“A lot of the young guys stepped up in very important moments, and for pretty much all of them, it was like their first playoff experience out there. For them to step up in that matter is really impressive,” Poeltl said. “It fills me with confidence for the future. I think it was good for those guys to have those kinds of experiences early on in their career, and, hopefully, they can build on it.”
That chance to play playoff basketball at a young age is something that Poeltl thinks will be a boon in the years to come. The Austrian big man has a more concrete perspective on it than most, having been in those shoes over his first three seasons in the NBA.
Poeltl, after being drafted in 2016, went to the playoffs as a bench big with Toronto in his first two seasons. Then, after being traded to the San Antonio Spurs, he played alongside LaMarcus Aldridge and Pau Gasol en route to another playoff berth as a 23-year-old starting for head coach Gregg Popovich.
So, as a former young contributor himself, he sees similar potential from the young guns slotting into playoff roles on the current Raptors — guys who “are kind of coming up and become X-factors, that (get) major roles… I think we have a few guys in there that can really change games for us.”
Barnes echoed that sentiment on Monday, touting the work he sees the young guys do “day in and day out.”
Barrett used the upstart Pistons as a blueprint, comparing Detroit’s path to playoff contention to their own. The young Pistons went from a 14-win team in 2023-24 to a 44-win side the next season, earning a playoff berth for the first time in five years, but ultimately losing to the New York Knicks in the first round.
With a newfound determination, the Pistons became a 60-win team this year and earned the No. 1 seed in the East, and will now square off against the Cavaliers in Round 2.
The Raptors, around their own young core, are hoping to achieve a similar growth as they head into the summer with a chance to reflect on what went right and what went wrong.
“It’ll do tremendous wonders for me. Feel like having five months to just get better, I’m gonna just work.” Murray-Boyles said.
Barnes added: “We still got a long ways to go, and I know I can just keep going from here on both ends of the floor. Every year, I’m just going to continue to get better. I got a lot to my game that I know I can get into.”
While internal growth will be the main factor guiding the Raptors next season, adding from outside will still be important for a team with glaring deficiencies.
Can they find spacing help? Rebounding help? A table-setter for the offence?
More than anything, what do they do with Poeltl?
The 30-year-old centre is coming off an injury-plagued campaign. He missed nearly half the year with a lingering back issue, and when he did take the floor, he didn’t look like the rebounder and rim protector the Raptors expected him to be when they signed him to a three-year, $84-million extension in the off-season — a deal that doesn’t kick in until the 2027-28 campaign.
“Obviously I would’ve liked to play more games this season, but now all we can really do is try to be better for the future,” Poeltl said of his season.
While there were stretches near the end of the year and in the playoffs where he looked like a contributor, he still appeared a step slower than opposing big men and saw his minutes dwindle in favour of the more athletic Murray-Boyles against the Cavaliers.
On Monday, Poeltl made it clear that the worst parts of the back injury are behind him and that he feels “pretty confident that it’s not going to be an issue long-term.” However, he still sees the injury as something that he’s “gonna have to continuously work on for the rest of my career, probably even past that, just to keep it contained as much as possible.”
As for his teammates, belief hasn’t wavered in the centre’s abilities.
“I think Jak was unbelievable for us. Jak helps me in so many different ways. His screens, the way he finds spots on the floor for me, [he’s] why I’m able to make those playmaking plays, and his touch around the rim,” Barnes said. “We need Jak on this team. Jak is so important for us.”