Denver is 5,280 feet above sea level. Most of Utah sits on a plateau around 4,000 feet above sea level. Why the geography lesson you ask? I’m trying to deduce whether the Raps can last a full four quarters before that thin air sucks the life right out of them like it did against the Nuggets. Prior to the game, I was hoping this answer would be yes. Sadly, I was wrong.

This is the equation I came up with early for the Raptors:

(Utah Basket x 3) + Raptors Turnover + 3 Raptors walking back + Utah Basket = Raptors Timeout after 2 Minutes

Not the start Triano and the Raps were looking for. I can hear it now - “Let’s go guys; you know we’re prone to slow starts. Let’s not get into a hole we need to dig ourselves out of again.”

Out of the timeout the Raps came out giving Bosh a touch – nice. Go to your big man and get him into the groove after an un-Boshlike game last night.

My second equation of the night:

Another 10 Utah points = 14-3 Utah lead = A furious Triano

What is it with the Raptors this year? We’ve become notorious for slow starts. It’s so tough to get out of these. Not all teams are like the Clippers – it’s a bit harder to get back against Utah when you’re down 20. We started getting owned in the paint because we had no energy. One point Leo made I really agreed with. The Jazz are like a well oiled machine out there. They run their sets, they know what shots they should take and they don’t settle early in the clock. Over the first quarter, it looked like the Raps were doing the exact opposite. We were taking the first shot we saw that looked half decent – most of these were outside the foul line. At the end of the first quarter, UTA 33 – TOR 17.

The second quarter was much of the same. The Raptors started to get some more flow on offense, but a lot of the time still ended stagnant. Bargs hit a couple of shots and got a few touches in the post when he was working for position. You want to prove to Bargnani that he deserves to get the ball down there when he’s working. I have a gut feeling that if our guards don’t find him, he’s going to get into the mindset that he’s supposed to be outside. He needs to grow into that multi-faceted big man. We’re seeing the growth, don’t get me wrong, I just want to ensure it keeps up.

The Raps and Jazz traded buckets for the most part in the second, minus the Raps going on a little run, led by Bosh, to end the half. Don’t let the score fool you; the game was a lot closer at half than it could have been considering how disgusting the Raps interior defense was and how many easy layups and dunks they surrendered: UTA 61 – TOR 52 after 24 minutes.

Sometimes basketball is a funny sport. All signs in a game point to you being down on a night when you start off extremely lax. But, somehow we pulled to within 4 points with 8 minutes to go in the 3^rd quarter. Granted at this point there was still a lot of time left, but it gave the Raps yet another chance at a fresh start. The open layups for Utah started to decrease, and the Raps started to contest the Jazz, sending them to the free throw line as opposed to letting them throw it down – make ‘em work boys, no easy buckets.

The Raps had a number of chances to hit a big shot and erase the lead completely, but they couldn’t knock it down. They couldn’t knock it down until Belinelli showed why he deserves to be on the court these days. Buzzer beater – bam. I’m starting to like the swagger he brings to the court with his mouth guard dangling around and the look of stone cold indifference on his face you’d expect from a surgeon – the dude knows he’s got game. They had some wide open looks off some good drive and kicks, which is better than the stagnant flow we’ve seen before. With 12 minutes to play, the Raps still found themselves in striking distance: UTA 78 – TOR 75.

I guess that extra 1,280 feet didn’t make a difference. The Raps flat out ran out of gas again. Every shot hit front rim in the fourth and you could tell that once again their legs were running on fumes. You never like to lose, but you’d rather lose because you couldn’t hit a few timely shots as opposed to losing due to a complete lack of effort on the defensive end. As much as the Raps had their terrible moments, they did pick it up on the defensive end once again in the second half. But as we have seen too much this year, it ends up being a swan song of too little too late. The Raps had to expel so much energy to get within striking distance that they couldn’t pull off the comeback – all Swedish, no Finnish. The Jazz pull it out over the Raptors 104 – 91, another frustrating night at the office.

The trend I’ve seen over the last couple of games is that it’s hard to get consistently good on defense when you’re a new team, playing against high caliber opponent’s night in and night out. Eventually, this shouldn’t, and cannot be, an excuse for bad defense. In order to be a good team, you need to be able to play consistent. Give me December and a healthy dose of the Knicks and Nets. Hopefully the weaker opponents let us work on some sets and systems, and get some things worked out for the home stretch. Through 12 games, a record of 5 – 7 is far from ideal for Raptor nation, but we still have 70 games to get our stuff together.

Let’s go Raptors. Ever since we were children we learned that the tortoise always beats the hare – slow and steady wins the race (just don’t make it too slow, I’m getting impatient).

Jordan Steffler

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Seb Beitel 2009-11-19 10:30:41 | Quote Well I'm glad I missed that one. I've been drinking a red bull before my basketball games lately. Maybe the Raps could do the same. Give them some wings. Heat/Magic/Pacers/Cats. Should get two outta those which will put my 7-9 November prediction right on point. I'm not worried. A healthy dose of Knicks/Nets is just what these boys need. 1 0

Rizwan Jafri 2009-11-19 10:39:17 | Quote There's one huge thing that I noticed during the second half of the game. Too many jumpshots. Aside from being tired and tired on defence the jumpshooting was killing us. The Raptors were in striking distance and they decide to shoot continuous jumpers that make the rim look smaller than the ball. I'll say it once and I'll say it again: when in doubt, give it to Bosh. They should be feeding the ball inside and working their way out if needed. Bosh shot 9 freethrows yesterday when he's averaging around 14. They need to get the ball to Bosh and get players in foul trouble because they are perfectly capable of doing that. At least they are showing some signs of greatness and hopefully time will make them better. Let's not give Miami such a warm welcome. 0 0