The Toronto Raptors just keep on rolling, with Brandon Ingram and Scottie Barnes leading the way.

Ingram dominated on offence in a 110-99 Monday night win over the Cleveland Cavaliers, while Barnes flashed his usual all-around game.

Ingram scored 37 points, his most since dropping 41 on the Raptors in February 2024, Barnes added 18 with 11 rebounds as Toronto swept the season series against last year’s class of the East, 3-0.

Cleveland was without former all-stars Jarrett Allen and Darius Garland, plus fellow starter De’Andre Hunter, sharp-shooter Sam Merrill and a couple of other regulars who had yet to miss a game, but still had plenty of talent on hand. But an off-night from Donovan Mitchell was tough to overcome.

Toronto’s 13-5 start to the season is its best after 18 games other than 14-4 accomplished in 2014-15, 2018-19 and 2019-20.

Some takeaways from a night that had the fans hopping at Scotiabank Arena:

HE’S A BAD MAN

Ingram didn’t look like someone who had landed on an opponent’s foot a few nights earlier. He also didn’t look like someone bothered by reigning NBA defensive player of the year Evan Mobley or even his old Los Angeles and New Orleans teammate Lonzo Ball, who both tried in vain to try to keep him in check.

Ingram shot 15-for-30 from the floor, including 5-for-11 from three-point range and also grabbed seven rebounds. Cleveland is 12-4 this year against opponents other than Toronto, but Ingram and Barnes have been too much for them.

Ingram said afterward he wasn’t impressed with his work a night earlier (14 points on just 6-for-18 shooting in a closer than anticipated win over Brooklyn) and also knew other players had to step up with RJ Barrett out of the lineup.

“I didn’t do much of anything last night, so it was finna time I do something,” Ingram said. 

“I felt good tonight. Just threw myself out there and was in the flow of the game. I didn’t feel myself getting tired. I just kept shooting. I kept doing what the defence was giving me.”

MISSING SOMETHING

With Barrett missing his first game of the season, Toronto had to adapt at shooting guard. Ja’Kobe Walter got the start after two strong games off Toronto’s bench. He was quiet offensively, but impactful at the other end, helping contain Mitchell.

Toronto will also need more from Gradey Dick with Barrett out for at least a few games, but Dick, who had been playing well, was as invisible as he’s been all season, going scoreless on five shot attempts.

Ochai Agbaji had a spectacular dunk, but otherwise also didn’t stand out.

The Raptors called on Jamison Battle, perhaps the best shooter on the team and a player who has arguably been better when on the floor than most of the other options at the position, early in the fourth quarter. Cleveland, scared by Battle’s shooting ability, closed out on him too aggressively, leading to three free throws nearly right after he entered.

Toronto’s offence missed Barrett’s ability to run the floor and finish. Barrett had been scoring 1.63 points per possessions off cuts this year, the fourth-best mark in the NBA and was generating free throws on 25% of his cuts, the same percentage as fellow Canadian and reigning MVP Shai Gilgeous-Alexander.

SPIDA CAUGHT IN RAPTORS’ WEB

Cavaliers superstar Donovan Mitchell is an extremely dangerous scorer and creator, but only had half of that equation going on Monday.

Toronto keyed its defence on the all-star and league leader in three-point attempts and while his eight assists were nice, Mitchell started the game just 3-for-14 from the field, including 1-for-7 on three-point attempts.

But Mitchell rallied to hit two triples in a row after the Cavaliers fell behind by 10 in the fourth to keep the game in play. But that was it for the visitors.

“That type of player, that magnitude of player, it’s really hard to contain him,” Rajakovic said. “I think as a team we did a really good job. It was Ja’Kobe. It was Jamal. It was Ochai. It was multiple players there. I thought we did a really good job on Mobley. Scottie did a really good job against him. And then the fourth quarter when the game was on the line, Scottie just turns into this monster where he gets all the stops and deflections and rebounds and points. He did an outstanding job there for us,” Rajakovic said of his own superstar.

TURNOVER TURMOIL

It felt like every time the Raptors seemed poised to take control of the game they tied one hand behind their backs. Turnovers were a constant issue.

Cleveland held a double-digit lead over Toronto in points created off turnovers for much of the contest. One way Toronto tried to ease the issue was by simply giving Ingram the ball and getting out of the way. Ingram made it work often, most commonly with pretty turnaround jump shots.

Quickley had only totalled two turnovers over his last three games, but had that many in three quarters alone on Monday.

Ingram had four turnovers in the first three quarters.

The offence stabilized though as the third quarter progressed and Toronto settled down, committing only one turnover in the final six minutes of the quarter to take an 88-76 lead.

While Ingram and Barnes ended up with four turnovers each, the point guards, Quickley and Shead, once again took great care of the ball. They combined for 14 assists but had only three turnovers. In the second half they had five of those assists, without a single turnover.

On X: @WolstatSun

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