{"id":717093,"date":"2026-04-24T11:45:52","date_gmt":"2026-04-24T11:45:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/717093\/"},"modified":"2026-04-24T11:45:52","modified_gmt":"2026-04-24T11:45:52","slug":"winners-and-losers-cavs-vs-raptors-game-3-raps-control-the-paint","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/717093\/","title":{"rendered":"Winners and Losers: Cavs vs Raptors Game 3 – Raps control the paint"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Cleveland Cavaliers<\/a> took a blow in their first game on the road against the Toronto Raptors.<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s go over today\u2019s losers, because there are no winners. Except the Tyson family, who deserve an honorary shout-out.<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s start by setting the table. Or, like the Cavs, by spilling things all over the place and causing a mess.<\/p>\n

Cleveland opened this game with nine turnovers in the first quarter. That\u2019s enough to break your back in the NBA Playoffs. The Cavs somehow managed to weather the storm and stay within two possessions at the end of the quarter \u2014 but it set the stage for how poorly things would go.<\/p>\n

Every potential run from the Cavaliers was met by these self-inflicted errors. That\u2019s not to take anything away from the Raptors, whose length and athleticism contributed directly to those turnovers, but throwing the ball into the third row (like James Harden did in the second half) is something most NBA players can avoid.<\/p>\n

\u201cI didn\u2019t think our spacing was great,\u201d said Kenny Atkinson after the game. \u201cCrowding the paint on our drives… they decided they really want to pack it, and I felt like we were trying to thread the needle too much trying to pass it in there.\u201d<\/p>\n

Dennis Schroder played five minutes in the first half. He turned it over three times in that stint and didn\u2019t play the rest of the game.<\/p>\n

Harden finished with a game-high 8 turnovers. That was his first playoff game with as many turnovers since 2019, when he was with the Houston Rockets. Some of his more careless giveaways were tough to watch. Though again, Toronto deserves credit for swarming him and making life a living hell.<\/p>\n

The Raptors forced Cleveland into 20 turnovers overall. They took those for 23 points off turnovers. That was more than enough to erase any marginal advantage the Cavs had gained on the offensive glass (16-11). The truth is, if you give up that many possessions, you lose the game more often than not.<\/p>\n

Much will be made of the Cavaliers\u2019 three-point defense in this game. Trust me, anyone who has read FTS this season has heard plenty of complaints about how this team has defended the perimeter.<\/p>\n

But while Toronto shot 14-23 (60%) from downtown in Game 3, the Cavs matched them in lockstep with 14 makes of their own. What truly buried the Cavs was Toronto\u2019s dominance in the paint, outscoring Cleveland 60-40 in the restricted area.<\/p>\n

Scottie Barnes bruised them for 33 points on 8-12 shooting from two-point range. RJ Barrett and Collin Murray Boyles joined in on the fun, combining for 55 points while shooting 17-26 inside the arc.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, the Cavs relied almost entirely on their outside shot. Cleveland took 45 three-point attempts and only 36 shots inside the arc. Harden, Mitchell, and Mobley took a combined 42 shot attempts, half coming from the three-point line, where they shot 4-21.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe [Boyles] is a warrior, to be honest with you,\u201d said Raptors\u2019 coach Darko Rajakovic after the game. \u201cI thought he had a high-level performance tonight and I contribute that to the power of his will.\u201d<\/p>\n

Toronto\u2019s hot shooting obviously opened the floor for them to dominate the paint. Cleveland\u2019s bigs, especially, started to drift further out to the three-point line at the cost of giving easier drives to the basket for the Raptors. I\u2019d say they should have stuck to the game plan and walled off the interior \u2014 but the Raptors simply couldn\u2019t miss, so I can\u2019t fully blame the Cavs for overreacting and trying to stay within range of three-point shooters.<\/p>\n

Nonetheless, Cleveland should be winning the battle of the paint. You can\u2019t always control whether your opponent will catch fire from downtown. But you can control the paint. Mobley and Allen weren\u2019t impactful enough tonight, even with their four blocks. Harden and Mitchell were also tested, routinely being put into Toronto\u2019s actions and failing to meet the moment.<\/p>\n

The Raptors won\u2019t replicate their 60% three-point shooting again. At least, I wouldn\u2019t expect them to. But I have no reason to believe they can\u2019t replicate what they did in the paint.<\/p>\n

The Cavs have to work harder in this regard or risk going back home with a tied series.<\/p>\n

LOSER – 4th Quarter Battle<\/p>\n

After (somehow) keeping this game close for 40 minutes, everything I mentioned finally came back to bite the Cavs in the fourth quarter.<\/p>\n

Jamison Battle jumped off the bench and nailed four-of-four three-point attempts. Barrett doused more gasoline on the fire while Barnes and CMB repeatedly forced the Cavaliers to launch their own three-point shots to no avail. Controlling the paint, nailing three-pointers, and forcing turnovers was the path to victory for Toronto.<\/p>\n

What followed was a 43-23 thrashing in the fourth quarter.<\/p>\n

I think it\u2019s worth reiterating that the Cavs did have this game within range before that final blow. It was a two-point game going into the final frame \u2014 and genuinely, nothing about the style of the previous 36 minutes was dramatically different from the closing 12.<\/p>\n

In other words, you could look at this game from two different perspectives. Glass half full? The Cavs played poorly, Toronto was red-hot, and yet the game was still within reach for most of the night.<\/p>\n

Half empty? The Raptors showed they can dictate the terms of engagement for 48 minutes and have a spark going into Game 4.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ll bounce back,\u201d said Aktinson. \u201cThis is part of the playoffs, it\u2019s part of the process.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Cleveland Cavaliers took a blow in their first game on the road against the Toronto Raptors. Let\u2019s…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":717094,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3772],"tags":[7,306,1236,305,193,3846,6],"class_list":{"0":"post-717093","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-cleveland-cavaliers","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-cavaliers","10":"tag-cavs-analysis","11":"tag-cleveland","12":"tag-cleveland-cavaliers","13":"tag-clevelandcavaliers","14":"tag-nba"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/116459522223301311","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/717093","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=717093"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/717093\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/717094"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=717093"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=717093"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=717093"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}