{"id":716728,"date":"2026-04-23T19:57:38","date_gmt":"2026-04-23T19:57:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/716728\/"},"modified":"2026-04-23T19:57:38","modified_gmt":"2026-04-23T19:57:38","slug":"its-hard-brandon-ingram-issues-candid-reality-check-on-his-playoff-struggles-as-raptors-face-0-2-hole","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/716728\/","title":{"rendered":"“It’s hard” – Brandon Ingram issues candid reality check on his playoff struggles as Raptors face 0\u20132 hole"},"content":{"rendered":"

The playoffs haven’t been going all too well for Toronto Raptors<\/a> forward Brandon Ingram<\/a>.\u00a0 After taking just nine shots to finish with 17 points in their Game 1 loss to the Cleveland Cavaliers<\/a> last Saturday, Ingram was candid<\/a> about being used as a screener and needing to take more shots.<\/p>\n

In Game 2, Monday night, Ingram took a lot more shots but ended up hitting fewer than he did in Game 1. The nine-year man out of Duke finished with just seven points on a dismal 3 of 15 from the field as the Raptors fell to a two-game hole in their Eastern Conference First Round series against the Cavs.<\/p>\n

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After an All-Star-worthy season that saw him put up 21.5 points a night, Ingram is averaging just 12 points in his first two playoff games as a Raptor. Safe to say, he isn’t living up to expectations, and the former Most Improved Player of the Year knows it.<\/p>\n

Ingram plans on ‘figuring it out’<\/p>\n

Speaking to the media ahead of Thursday night’s Game 3 matchup in Toronto, Ingram addressed his struggles and his emotions as he and the Raptors<\/a> try to avoid dropping a third game.<\/p>\n

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“It’s hard, you know? It’s tough, when you go back and you’re not doing your job, especially what they brought you here to do,” Ingram said<\/a> bluntly.<\/p>\n

Indeed Ingram was brought into the fold to bring another scoring threat to pair with versatile forward Scottie Barnes<\/a>, who has been the Raptors’ best player in the postseason so far.<\/p>\n

Still the series is far from over, and Ingram plans on finding a way to get back to his bucket-getting self.<\/p>\n

“Either you stay in it emotionally, or you continue to try to figure it out, and that’s what we’re going to try to do, figure it out,” Ingram added.<\/p>\n

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Fortunately for Ingram, he says he’s got a strong support group behind him, but admits he likes to take time to reflect.<\/p>\n

“My teammates are always there for me, my coaches, my support team at home, but I like to sit in disappointment for a little bit just to see where I went wrong, give myself some gratitude, think about the things that went well, and then get back into the fight and continue fighting,” he shared.<\/p>\n

Ingram says he’s eager to experience Toronto’s playoff atmosphere<\/p>\n

With Toronto having one of the most passionate fan bases in the league, playing at home could be the spark Ingram is looking for this postseason.<\/p>\n

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“It’s been loud all season, every game that we had this year, the seats were filled up, so I’m really excited to see how it’s going to be when we play our first playoff game here,” Ingram said<\/a>.<\/p>\n

No doubt, the Raptors are gonna need everything they can get from Ingram and the home fans if they plan on defending home court.<\/p>\n

The Raptors are going against history<\/p>\n

Unfortunately for the Raptors, history won’t be on their side, as they’ve been on the losing end against the Cavaliers in the playoffs since LeBron James’ era<\/a> in 2016.<\/p>\n

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Including the first two games of this series, the Cavaliers have won 11 straight playoff games against the Raptors, with their last loss dating back to May 2016.<\/p>\n

With everything at stake, Game 3 is definitely going to be a must-watch.<\/p>\n

This story was originally published by Basketball Network<\/a> on Apr 23, 2026, where it first appeared in the Latest News<\/a> section. Add Basketball Network as a Preferred Source by clicking here.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The playoffs haven’t been going all too well for Toronto Raptors forward Brandon Ingram.\u00a0 After taking just nine…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":716729,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3770],"tags":[7,4441,193,1409,185,6,681,1261,680,476,3820],"class_list":{"0":"post-716728","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-toronto-raptors","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-brandon-ingram","10":"tag-cleveland-cavaliers","11":"tag-eastern-conference","12":"tag-lebron-james","13":"tag-nba","14":"tag-raptors","15":"tag-scottie-barnes","16":"tag-toronto","17":"tag-toronto-raptors","18":"tag-torontoraptors"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/116455790623550881","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/716728","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=716728"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/716728\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/716729"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=716728"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=716728"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=716728"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}