Kyle Lowry disappeared during the Raptors' first-round playoff exit. He'll get another chance to prove himself on the big stage this season for a team that will only go as far as he will take it.
A noticeably slimmed-down Kyle Lowry was asked about his diet change this summer during media day. "Sometimes you get older," he said. "You have to change your body a little bit. It's about the future for me. It's about being healthy." The 29-year-old point guard wanted to look ahead, but with a first-round playoff sweep at the hands of the Wizards still fresh in everyone's mind, including Lowry's, this was an opportunity to revisit a past that will haunt the Raptors until they prove to be a capable playoff team and not a team that can beat up on competition below them, but come up short when it matters.
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For a season that started out with so much promise, the team's uneven second-half play that extended into the playoffs is all that anyone remembers. Despite last impressions, it wasn't all bad. In December, Lowry was the only player in the league to average 20-plus points and over 8.5 assists, putting up 22.3 and 8.9, respectively, to go along with 4.2 rebounds and 1.9 steals in 15 games. He scored a career-high 39 points at Utah, handed out a season-high 14 assists at Cleveland and set another career mark with six steals in New York.
The Raptors lost DeMar DeRozan to injury, but they kept winning, and suddenly, they were competing for the top seed in the Eastern Conference. Lowry was named Player of the Month, he was their leader, and an efficient player on the floor, shooting 46.3 percent from the field, 40.5 percent from beyond the arc, and 85.9 percent from the free throw line. In a superstar-driven league, the Raptors had their own. Lowry was magnificent, on his way to becoming an All-Star Game starter in February.After the new year, the Raptors' deficiencies on the defensive end started to catch up with them. They still won a franchise-best 49 games, and ran away with the Atlantic Division, but they were also a bottom-ten team in defensive efficiency and their point guard was wearing down. Lowry shot below 40 percent in both January and February. He missed nine games down the stretch with a lower back injury, and dealt with hamstring and finger injuries, as well. In 17 games after the All-Star break, his numbers dipped to 15.1 points, 5.4 assists and 4.5 rebounds per game while shooting a paltry 37.3 percent from the field.
"I know how bad I played," Lowry said. "It is what it is." He started to force the issue on offence, and was probably not healthy enough to carry the load. In the four playoff losses to the Wizards, he totaled 19 assists, 18 field goals (shooting 31.6 percent from the field), 18 fouls and 12 turnovers. He maintains the weight loss was for personal reasons, but watching John Wall and Bradley Beal—who waved goodbye to Lowry after he fouled out late in Game 1—dominate the backcourt battle probably serves as motivation, too."Everything drives me," Lowry said. "I read everything. I see everything. I know every person that said something bad about me. I don't need the motivation from that, but I use it."In Lowry's first preseason game against the Clippers, he scored 26 points in 22 minutes, getting to the line 12 times, showing off his quickness and ability to not only get to the basket, but creating the space required to make shots when he's there. He followed that up with a 25-point performance against the Lakers a few nights later. Last week, in his first game at the Air Canada Centre since last year's playoff loss, Lowry scored 40 points in three quarters of play, setting a preseason franchise record for points."Not a damn thing," he told reporters afterward when asked about the record. "At the end of the day, it's about maintaining [myself], starting well and finishing well." These stats don't matter to Lowry, but teammates and coaches have taken notice.
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"He's turned it up a notch," DeMarre Carroll said."He's hot as a firecracker right now," Dwane Casey remarked.The exhibition stats might not matter to Lowry, who scored six points on 2-of-11 shooting in his latest game, but the preseason itself is important for a team with significant roster turnover like the Raptors had this summer."We're using these games as practice," Lowry said. "Just to get people on the same page which is why these preseason games are a little more important this year."Carroll, the team's prized free-agent signing, reiterated how useful the preseason can be for this team."There are a lot of new people here," Carroll said after Sunday's preseason victory over Cleveland. "We have to understand where guys are going to be, what their strong points are. It'll come in time, it just won't happen overnight."Carroll, along with Bismack Biyombo, are a few of the acquisitions made this summer by Masai Ujiri with the intent of fixing things on the defensive end. Have the coaches communicated how the team's defence might have been a bit loose last season, especially in the second half? "Obviously they sensed it so that's a priority this year," Lowry said, noting how meticulous Casey has been in camp so far. The Raptors point guard believes the signing of Carroll "puts everybody in the right positions." The new Raptors forward has the ability to play both the three and four spots, and allows Terrence Ross to shift his focus back to dealing with shooting guards, instead of being outmatched at the three.
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"Defence is my calling card," Carroll said. "The offence will come and go, so I have to focus on defence and keep this team thinking about defence."
Regardless of what Carroll brings to the table, how the Luis Scola-Patrick Patterson power forward battle shapes out, and what Cory Joseph can provide as the second-unit point guard on a more balanced team, the Raptors will only go as far as Lowry takes them. Even if last season is now mostly remembered as a failure, Lowry refuses to take a negative approach, instead choosing to focus on building from the successful parts of the 2014-15 season."At the end of the day, I was still an All-Star starter, we still set a franchise record in wins, we won the division, we did some very good things. But we didn't get to our goal. The year was, for me personally, a success, and for the team it was a success because of the wins. We just didn't go out the way we could have went out."Lowry will get another chance to prove himself in the playoffs again this season. But first, he might turn the regular season into his own revenge tour. If so, we can set aside the other concerns with this team. If Lowry plays like a superstar and stays healthy, this might be the best Raptors team yet.
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