Tonight, Toronto Raptors will face off against the Utah Jazz, starting a 5-game home stand that will carry them to the All-Star break. This is their first of two matchups against the Jazz this season, the other slated to occur in late March.<\/p>\n
Toronto was able to prevail in both games against the Jazz last year, earning the series sweep. This could be a good reset for the Raptors who have just dropped consecutive games against Orlando and New York. Of course, it will be important for Toronto to enter the game with the right mindset, as several \u201ceasy win\u201d contests against the Wizards, Nets, and Hornets haven\u2019t gone in their favour despite overwhelming odds.<\/p>\n
So how do the Raptors walk away with this one?<\/p>\n
Utah just finished a home stand where they dropped five consecutive games. Lauri Markkanen and Keyonte George have headlined for the Jazz this season, carrying one of the weakest teams in the league to a surprising 15-34 record. Losing Walker Kessler to a shoulder surgery early on for the remainder of the season was the biggest blow, but they\u2019re in the midst of a rebuild and the health of their vets varies by day, meaning they\u2019re relying on young talents who are likely outperforming expectations.<\/p>\n
Take Brice Sensabaugh for instance. Drafted in 2023, he\u2019s averaged mediocre numbers for most of his career, but is starting to come to life for the Jazz in January. He posted almost 18-4-2 for them last month while playing 27 minutes per game. He had seven 20+ point games, one of which he ended with 43 points against the Bulls.<\/p>\n
Of course, stats don\u2019t necessarily give you the full picture. Interestingly enough, on paper, the Jazz have more assists and rebounds per game than the Raptors do, but despite strong individual performances and solid numbers, they haven\u2019t been able to turn that into substantial wins.<\/p>\n
Which leads us to what the Raptors will need to do to take advantage. Over the Jazz\u2019s losing stretch, their turnovers were one of their biggest weaknesses. Coughing the ball up 19 times in one contest while averaging almost 16 a game almost guarantees a losing outcome. The Raptors have proven all season that this is where they shine, creating turnovers, getting out in transition, and scoring. This will be one of the keys to this game, as there will likely be more opportunities than usual to do so.<\/p>\n
They will also have to prioritize shutting down Utah\u2019s tandem of Markkanen and George and force the others to score. This leaves guys like Svi Mykhailiuk, rookie Ace Bailey, or sophomore Kyle Filipowski responsible for the majority of scoring which isn\u2019t any of their strong suit.<\/p>\n
Their injury report is extensive, with Nurkic listed as questionable. This could give Toronto a size advantage, something that they haven\u2019t had much of this year. The combination of Barnes, Ingram, and CMB on Markkanen and Filipowski should be enough to limit him on the boards, but a group effort will be necessary to prevent easy second chance points for the Jazz.<\/p>\n
Ingram looked more true to form in his last two outings, so hopefully he can be a factor in the win tonight as well. It would be nice for Toronto to go into the All-Star break with some momentum, and this home stand is the perfect opportunity.<\/p>\n
Toronto: Brandon Ingram, Scottie Barnes, Collin Murray-Boyles, Immanuel Quickley, RJ Barrett<\/p>\n
Utah: Lauri Markkanen, Ace Bailey, Kyle Filipowski, Svi Mykhailiuk, Keyonte George<\/p>\n
Toronto: Chucky Hepburn (Out: G-League), Jakob Poeltl (Out: Lower back strain)<\/p>\n
Utah: Keyonte George (Questionable: Left ankle sprain), Elijah Harkless (Out: G-League), Walker Kessler (Out: Shoulder surgery), Kevin Love (Questionable: Illness), Georges Niang (Out: Left foot soreness), Jusuf Nurkic (Questionable: Illness), John Tonje (Out: G-League), Oscar Tshiebwe (Out: G-League)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Tonight, Toronto Raptors will face off against the Utah Jazz, starting a 5-game home stand that will carry…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":575350,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3785],"tags":[7,5842,423,6,422,427,3972],"class_list":{"0":"post-575349","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-utah-jazz","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-general","10":"tag-jazz","11":"tag-nba","12":"tag-utah","13":"tag-utah-jazz","14":"tag-utahjazz"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/115996207918860619","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/575349","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=575349"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/575349\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/575350"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=575349"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=575349"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=575349"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}