Barnes recorded 11 points (5-11 FG, 0-1 3Pt, 1-2 FT), three steals, two rebounds and two assists across 12 minutes in Saturday's 129-105 preseason loss to the Heat.
Shead finished Saturday's 129-105 preseason loss to the Heat with three points (1-7 FG, 0-3 3Pt, 1-2 FT), eight assists, five rebounds, two steals and one block in 28 minutes.
Key contributed 15 points (5-9 FG, 4-7 3Pt, 1-2 FT) and one rebound across 16 minutes in Saturday's 129-105 preseason loss to the Heat.
Leonard has yet to participate in contact drills and is unlikely to play in Toronto's preseason opener Saturday against Miami, Josh Lewenberg of TSN.ca reports.
Battle was held out of Thursday's scrimmage due to a lower back injury, Josh Lewenberg of TSN.ca reports.
Anderson sat out of Thursday's scrimmage due to a bruised right knee, Josh Lewenberg of TSN.ca reports.
Graves did not participate in the Raptors' scrimmage Thursday after tweaking his groin in practice, Josh Lewenberg of TSN.ca reports.
Barrett wants to stay with the Raptors, per Sam Amico of HoopsWire.com.
Shead and the Raptors agreed to a three-year, $24 million extension Thursday, Shams Charania of ESPN reports.
Barnes expects to spend more time on the ball this season, per Michael Grange of Sportsnet.ca.
The Cleveland Cavaliers were on the brink of being down three games to two, but came together to go on a scoring run that carried over into the fourth quarter. That can be the spark for a Cavaliers team that lost the two games in this series with poor fourth quarter play in games three and four. Cleveland finishes off Toronto, and ends the streak of the home team winning every game.
DraftKings. With Brandon Ingram unlikely to suit up tonight, the Raptors will be searching for answers offensively outside of Scottie Barnes and RJ Barrett. One source for them in these playoffs has been Collins Murray-Boyles. The rookie has stepped up, scoring 15.2 points per game, while clearing this line in four of five games. Outside of the Raptors stars, he’s leads the role players in usage rate (20%) and leads the whole team in paint touches per game (7.8) in these playoffs. Look for Murray-Boyles to step up in Game 6.
Brandon Ingram is doubtful, and Scottie Barnes will play through a quad injury. That injury severely affected Barnes in Game 5; he scored 14 points before getting hurt, then went 0 for 6 with three points the rest of the way. RJ Barrett continues to play nearly 40 minutes and produce. Contract-extension eligible this offseason, Barrett is proving his worth. He's averaging 24.4 points, 7.2 rebounds and 3.8 assists in the series. With Toronto facing elimination, look for Barrett to be very aggressive offensively yet again.
Cleveland's James Harden has had 3+ threes made in four of the five games in the series, averaging 3.2 a game. He's throwing it up there an average of 7.8 attempts a game over the five games. Going further back to April 1, Harden has 3+ made threes in seven of his last nine games, with the only other miss being the final game of the regular season, when he only played 25 minutes in a game that meant nothing to the Cavs. Harden scores from deep when he generates isolation looks, which is Toronto's weakness (21st in the league).
Two games ago the total for RJ Barrett was 19.5. It’s gone way up, but so has Barrett’s shooting, just 13 attempts the first two games, 19, 22 and 19 the last three. Toronto won two of those games, and Barrett scored 33 and 25 in two of them. Cleveland ranks 28th in points allowed to the power forward spot. Toronto is battling injuries with Brandon Ingram hobbled, Immanuel Quickley out and Scottie Barnes perhaps less than 100%.
This line is simply too low for Evan Mobley who averaged 18 PPG in the regular season and has scored 15+ in 4/5 games in this series. It should come as little surprise that when Mobley is aggressive offensively, it has resulted in the Cavs being successful. Cleveland wants to avoid a Game 7 and I expect Mobley to get up plenty of quality looks tonight.
Collin Murray-Boyles didn’t do much in the first half of Game 5, but still finished with eight points and five rebounds over 25 minutes. For the series, he is averaging 15.2 points and 6.8 rebounds. In the two home games, he combined for 30 and 25 points and rebounds. Immanuel Quickley (hamstring) is still out, Brandon Ingram (heel) is questionable and it looked like something was bothering Scottie Barnes in the second half of Game 5. Murray-Boyles should play around 25 minutes and take more than the five shots that he attempted Wednesday, so I like this over.
