Last-Minute News, Rumours, Reports before Toronto Raptors vs Philadelphia 76ers Game

With 74 seconds left, the Toronto Raptors were up by three against the Boston Celtics. And then they never scored again. Nimo Keita got a dunk, two Jason Tatum free throws, and Boston walked out of that game with a 98-93 win. Now 24 hours later, they have to go on a plane and face Philadelphia. And they have LeBron James, Joel Embiid, Tyrese Maxey, Jalen Brown, all in the same Sixers jerseys that are rested and have a 9-3 record. But that record does have one crack in it. Two nights ago, those same Celtics walked into Philly and beat the Sixers by 22 points. So is the Sixers team as scary as that 9-3 record says they are? And could a Raptors team without Kawhi Leonard, potentially without Scottie Barnes, come out in this one and steal a W? Because the Toronto Raptors proved something interesting against the Boston Celtics. Toronto put up 38 points in the first quarter and led by as many as 22 points in the second and led after every single quarter. Besides the fourth, of course, because they ended up losing that game. A big part of it was because they only scored 13 points in the final frame of that night. And even then, the Celtics were on the ropes with just seconds left out there in this game. Tatum hit a 12-footer to put Boston up by one. Obviously, that was a little contested fadeaway, an impressive shot by Jason Tatum. But then R.J. Barrett, after having a really rough night, Came back and hit an extremely tough floater himself and then had a running dunk after a steal from Jamal Shead and the Raptors had the lead with 93-90 at the end of this game. But as mentioned, that was the last time the Raptors scored. Boston was on the second night of a back-to-back themselves, so somehow they had more legs, more energy, and just more offensive firepower down the stretch of that game. Tatum made just 6 of 21 shots, the Toronto Raptors defense was absolutely clamps in that game, but nonetheless, he got to the line 12 times, so people are blaming the referees a little bit, and again, definitely had an impact, but it wasn't the reason the Raptors lost, and the Celtics were able to pull it out. Nimo Keita was another problem for the Raptors, he had 13 points, 3 blocks, and was a plus 27 in 31. So obviously that's an issue, your big man defense, and Emmanuel quickly also really struggled for the Toronto Raptors, once again, having a poor 3 point shooting night, shooting just 1 of 8 from behind the arc. Barrett made just 5 of 16 shots, and even with those 2 big buckets late, it was overall a poor game out there for RJ, even though I thought he played solid defense, and did some other stuff out there in the court, like facilitated and got rebounds. At least Jacoby Walter broke out of his slump, as he hit 5 of 10 of his threes. And the bench put up 42 points, with Elijah Martin making four of his five three-point shots in just 16 minutes of action. Allen Graves was phenomenal as well, and the roleplayers on the Raptors really carried this team without their two best players. Which brings up a very important question for the game against the Sixers, is who the heck is even playing? Kawhi Leonard is still out with his knee issue, and so are Nate Biddle and Trace Jackson-Davis. Kawhi has now missed nine straight games, and this team's last update said we'll get another word regarding Kawhi come next week. Scottie of course missed the game against the Celtics as well with a groin issue and the word from the team is he is still day to day and progressing well. As of recording, we don't have an update on Scottie Barnes yet, but There's a chance he definitely plays tonight. He's, of course, been their best player so far this season, averaging 23.5 points a game with 2.2 steals a night. Without him this season, the Toronto Raptors are 1-2. And that one win definitely does matter, though, because it came against the Milwaukee Bucks without Barnes, without Kawhi, and without Immanuel Quickley, and they still won that game by 14. Quickly still dealing with injuries himself as he came back from a two-game absence, you know, in this one against the Boston Celtics, and CMB played through his illness. Statistically you can see the guy was playing through an illness as he didn't look that great out there on the court. So hopefully he's looking a little bit fresher recovering from that illness but nonetheless we're hoping the Toronto Raptors stay fresh on the second night of a back-to-back. This is their second back-to-back this season and the first one they lost to the Lakers on the front half of it and they end up beating the Clippers in their building the next night beating them 125 to 118. However, Philly is coming to this one with their own injury report, as they have two big names on it. Joel Embiid is day-to-day with a foot issue, and LeBron James is day-to-day with a back problem. Both have sack games already this year, but every time it was on a back-to-back for Philly, and Thursday isn't one for the Sixers. They had Wednesday off out there, you know, staying at home, so I'd imagine we're going to expect both of them to be playing in this game tonight. Before we get to Philly, let me know in the comments if you think Scottie Barnes is going to play in this one. I want to talk about this Philadelphia 76ers roster because it is completely different than what we've seen before. This summer, the Boston Celtics traded Jalen Brown to Philly for Paul George and picks, and ESPN sources said Brown never asked out. There was a lot of drama following their last game as Jalen Brown wasn't willing to dap up Jason Tatum before the game. Nonetheless, he's on the Sixers now, and he's still a really good basketball player. Then in July, as we all remembered, LeBron James picked Philadelphia for his 24th NBA season on a two-year deal worth about $8 million. And when all four of their stars play, the Sixers are 6-2. Tyrese Maxey is still their engine, averaging 26.7 points a game, and Jalen Brown is right behind him at 21.5. Embiid is down a little bit this season, averaging just 17.7 a night, but he lives at the free throw line with 73 free throw attempts in 10 games. And we know, if he's facing the Toronto Raptors the way the Raptors get called for fouls, he's going to live there even more. LeBron is just playing probably, you know, people call LeBron the GOAT or one of the greatest players of all time, but what he's doing this season is GOAT role-player stuff. He's not the primary scorer anymore, but he's the passer for this team, averaging 6.5 assists a game. But interestingly enough, a lot of people said the Sixers got the best of that trade, but it didn't look super great in the game against the Celtics. Obviously, they let go of Paul George, and he scored 36 points on 14 of 22 shooting, and Brown just finished with 13 points and four turnovers. That win moved Boston to first in the Eastern Conference ahead of Philly. And the next day, Colin Cowart said it on Fox, that Philadelphia has no bench. Now, I think that's a bit of a stretch, as they do have Simons, they do have Dean Wade. They have a lot of guys I actually like on the Sixers bench, but they haven't really been struggling so far this... They've been struggling a little bit so far this season. And his point specifically was the money, as Jalen Brown's making $57.7 million this season, and that goes up to $65.6 million in 2028. And Anthony Simons is a guy that has. Been explosive offensively at times over the course of his career, but he's averaging just 9.7 points a game on 39% shooting. But the real guys that are letting them down is Contavious Caldwell-Pope, averaging just 5.2 points a night, and Dean Wade at 3.7. Now, we've seen what both those guys can do in the playoffs. Dean Wade against the Toronto Raptors last season. They're both great defenders, but they're not hitting shots. That's an area where the Toronto Raptors can get the best of the Sixers. I mean, that thin bench shows up in the margins. Right now, the Sixers are 9-3, which looks great on paper, but if you dig into it, you find something different. Over 12 games, Philadelphia has outscored its opponents by a total of 12 points. And of course, the Raptors have a lot worse record. They're currently at 5-6 right now, but they have outscored their opponents by 28. 7 of Philadelphia's 9 wins came by 8 points or fewer, and their 3 losses were absolute blowouts. 13 at home to the Detroit Pistons, 24 in Cleveland, and 22 at home against the Boston Celtics. 2-3 of those games came in their own building, which of course is where the Raptors are playing tonight. Toronto is the opposite right now. Three of its six losses came by seven points or fewer, including a five-point loss last night. So when Philadelphia's good, they squeak by, and when they lose, it's really, really bad. And so far, we're very early into this NBA season, but those are the types of numbers you can really judge and might be a better indication than the actual records early on in the year. If the Sixers are a team that have to win every game by a tight margin, you can easily steal that away, even with some of your top guys out. And for Toronto, it's going to come down to three things. Maxi and Bede at the line and the bench scoring. Of course, the number one is Maxi because this dude has absolutely killed the Toronto Raptors in the past. And maybe gives me nightmares every time that we face him against the Saints. Last season, he averaged 31.5 points per game in four games against the Toronto Raptors. In an overtime game in January, he played 45 minutes and scored 38 points. Now, Toronto still won that game because Scottie Barnes scored 31 points and Jamal Murray had 22. The Raptors did a good job on the superstar of the other team last night against the Boston Celtics as Jason Tatum was held to an unreasonable amount of points, and hopefully that's the case for Tyrese Maxey in this one again. But the second key to this game is really the biggest one. I think it's going to be the part that might be the toughest to overcome for the Toronto Raptors, but they're going to need to do it. And that is the free throws. Boston shot 28 free throws last night, and Embiid has made 65 of his 73 this season. In the two games that Joel Embiid faced off against the Toronto Raptors last year, he scored 29 and 27, and Philadelphia won both of those games. Now, anyone that's watched this channel has seen me crash out generationally at the poor defense we had at the center position last year, but Yakir Portal has definitely been looking better over the past week. Still not super mobile, but you need him to be able to keep Embiid off the glass and most importantly, not live at the free throw line. Guard without fouling. Don't let him get any easy shots. And then if Portal can hold that matchup because it's going to be tough for CMB or any of the smaller guys to match up with the mountain that is Joel Embiid out there on the court, the Raptors will be in good shape. If not, this is going to be an ugly game. And the third key to this game is the bench scoring. James Embiid has made 23 of his 54 Elijah Martin has made 12 of 20. The 1-6-0 shooter off the bench is Anfernee Simons, who has made 27 of his 69 threes. And Toronto guards can't lose him in transition. We've seen Anfernee Simons go off against the Toronto Raptors in the past as well. If you cut him out and try to make anyone else on that bench beat you, the Raptors will probably be in good shape. And even with the Raptors depleted with two of their top guys out, you know, more players having to step up, even with the Raptors being on the second night of a back-to-back, I'm still a bigger believer in this Raptors bench than I am the Sixers. But beyond this, there's two matchups that are going to be very important to this game. The first is how R.J. Barrett's going to do against the Sixers defense and how he's going to guard because he did a good job, switched on to the Tatums of the world, the Derrick Whites of the world last night. I think he's going to be facing Jalen Brown and R.J. is scoring 20.5 points a night and Brown is at 21.5. So on paper, it's a fairly even matchup. But obviously, Jalen Brown's the guy that's won a Finals MVP that's been on those amazing Boston Celtics teams and stuff, and the three-point line is a huge differentiating factor between these two players. Beard has made just 15 of his 56 attempts from behind the arc this season, and of course, he's best at attacking. And against Philadelphia last season, he scored 22 in both games he played on 13 of 24 shooting. And Jalen Brown's been a little bit out of it mentally with all this Jason Tatum stuff going on and against the Celtics, he had four turnovers and some foul trouble against Boston. So if RJ Barrett can capitalize a little bit on that downward momentum and the Raptors could be in decent shape. And the second one I think is a little bit juicy, but it's VJ Edgecombe versus Jacoby Walter. I feel like Edgecombe gets a lot of notoriety and, you know, he's putting up 12.7 points per game, 6.3 rebounds and 1.5 steals is doing a good job being the ideal role player to To a team with a bunch of big names and... He's played well against the Raptors. He scored in double figures in all four matchups last season and had one game where he scored 21 points. Jacoby Walter is quietly a very similar player to Vijay Edgecombe. And Edgecombe's a bit more bouncy, a bit more of a slasher and all that. But Jacoby Walter's been an elite three-point shooter, had a really good game against the Boston Celtics, tends to just show up against some of the better teams out there in the NBA. I'm really interested to see how this matchup goes. And also, as I broke down a couple days ago with the Kawhi Leonard injury news popping Each and every single one of these games are a lot bigger for the Toronto Raptors now than they might feel like, given the fact it's still November, it's early on in the season, and all this stuff that, you know, people start ramping up basketball, you know, post-Christmas and all that. I get it. The Eastern Conference is an absolute bloodbath this season, and you cannot get behind the eight ball, you know, at the start of this year. After a few recent losses, the Toronto Raptors are currently 7th in the Eastern Conference at a record of 5-6. They're a half game behind Cleveland for that 6th seed, which is going to be highly coveted this year as you want to stay out of that play-in tournament. Philadelphia is 2nd right now, a game behind Boston. Personally, I'm not sold on the Sixers staying that high in the standings. I think as the season progresses, especially if the Raptors get Scottie Barnes and Kawhi Leonard back relatively healthy, I think these teams are going to be a lot closer in the standings by the end of the year than they are right now. So getting a big win early on in the season will be very important. And the record early on is a bit shaky as well, right? You face the Knicks for two games in a row, you know, their next two matchups. So that's three tough games you have ahead of your schedule and you want to at least scrape out a couple of them. If you can go 500 in this game, these games you have against the Celtics, the Sixers, and the Knicks, and that is a phenomenal outcome, especially considering the injuries. But obviously, after a loss to Boston, the Sixers are going to come out of this one angry and fired up, which makes sense. They're on their home court. They're going to want to win. If they steal this game, the Raptors be back out of the play-in tournament and then have a couple of good battles against the Knicks on their home court next week. ESPN's predictor gives Philadelphia a 71.8% chance of winning this game, and Philadelphia is 4-2 at home this season. The Raptors are 3-3 on the road. Last season, the Sixers and the Raptors split both of their games. They played four games. Both teams won two. But comment down below. Who do you think is going to win this game? The Toronto Raptors or the Philadelphia 76ers? If you want my reaction to the Raptors-Celtics game, check out this video right here.