There have been 12 quarters played in the 2019 NBA Finals so far, and the Raptors have been distinctly better in nine-and-a-half of them, with Game 4 underlining that, writes Mark Deeks.
Hugely impressive in their first NBA Finals appearance, Toronto's win in Friday night's game puts them up 3-1 over the two-time defending champion Golden State Warriors. And were it not for a 20-1 Warriors run in the third quarter of Game 2, they would have closed out the sweep by now.
Toronto now return home hoping to close out the series in front of their passionate home fans. Even if they are unable to do this in Game 5, they only need to win one of the next three games, of which they have home-court advantage in two. Friday night's game was thus a must-win for the Warriors, and they lost it.
If Golden State are to now pull off three straight victories against a Raptors team that has proven they are better with the respective personnel as currently constituted - ie. without Kevin Durant - then they are simply going to have to make changes, most of them defensive.
When Golden State were at the peak of this five-year run, they were just as dominant defensively as they were offensively. The glamour and record-setting involved in Steph Curry's historic shooting, paired with the model of efficiency that was Klay Thompson alongside him, gave rise to the Iconic tag of the 'Splash Brothers', and catalysed an ongoing debate on whether primarily jump shooting teams can win championships. Yet the defence, while not as catchy or marketable, was just as good.
Between 2014 and 2018, the Warriors ranked first, fifth, second and 11th in regular-season defensive rating. This year, that ranking dropped to a distinctly middle-of-the-pack 13th, continuing a decline that, were it not for an abnormally severe shooting slump by the Houston Rockets in Game 7 of last year's Western Conference Finals, would have cost them a championship. It looks as though it is about to cost them this one.
Personnel-wise, the Warriors of now are much the same as the Warriors of then. But, for some, this is in name only. Andrew Bogut, the defensive wall on the interior prior to Durant's arrival, is not near where he was. Shaun Livingston is now essentially a back-up small forward without a favourable defensive match-up.
Andre Iguodala still makes very savvy plays on the ball when in the right position, but his mobility (which was limited even before the calf injury that clearly plagues him in these finals; note how often Thompson is having to check Kawhi Leonard instead) prevents him from being able to play in space, track the play and recover like he once did. And although Draymond Green still has the spectacular versatility that he changed conventional theory on the sport of basketball with, he cannot do it alone.
Indeed, it is the communication and rotation between themselves that is costing the Warriors here. The Raptors are showing what can be done; starting with the speed and length of the Leonard and Pascal Siakam duo at forward, along with former defensive player of the year Mark Gasol behind them at centre, former league-leading shot-blocker Serge Ibaka behind him and a trio of plucky guards in the form of Fred VanVleet, Kyle Lowry and Danny Green, the Raptors have no defensive weakness in their line-up, and they coordinate on when to trap and where to pressure extremely well.
Notwithstanding individual heroics by Leonard, it is this half-court defence that is behind the Raptors' dominance thus far. They have scouted the Warriors' offensive trends very well, as evidenced by how little space Curry has both on and off the ball.
Curry's ability to shoot in almost no space whatsoever generally makes it very difficult to prevent him from getting whichever looks he wants, and his extremely high level of off-ball movement makes him an Incredibly difficult player to guard even when not handling. Toronto, however, have made sure there is always a wall around the top of the arc so that he gets no space in ball-screen action, and somehow combine that with chasing him off the ball with strategic switching, itself born out of good communication, to ensure he cannot just run to the corner either.
It is a half-court defensive masterclass from the Raptors, and it is causing the perpetually turnover-prone Warriors to make a fatal number of mistakes. The Warriors have ridden their luck throughout this dynastic run with their knack of turnovers, often of the sloppy variety, normally so unbecoming of a title contender. They have always gotten away with it before. Not now.
Regardless of their struggles against half-court defensive pressure, Golden State's main problem is that they are not doing the same back to Toronto. The pick-and-roll remains the most fundamental offensive concept within basketball, and yet the Warriors are not defending it well right now.
This exposable weakness is not something new to their Finals' performance, or even this post-season. Golden State have been struggling with this all season long, and it is the major reason why the defence has tailed away to average. Curry - always a better defender than he is credited for, with good hands and a willingness to play physical despite having no meat on him - is a pretty good option for this when not required to take a lower energy defensive role to save him up for offence. Yet his back-up, Quinn Cook, is neither of those things. And at centre, DeMarcus Cousins has to be dropped back defensively, leaving the perimeter defender having to cover both positions and all passing angles, immediately creating a hole.
More than the failings and shortcomings of any individual, though, has been the lack of urgent-enough communication among even those equipped to defend it. You would think that a fleet-of-foot possession winner like Draymond would be one to stay away from, yet so confident are the Raptors with this strategy, and so slow have the Warriors (Green included) been to communicate how to defend it, that they are exploiting it even when he is in.
The fact that Leonard can also play the ball-handling half of the pick-and-roll - and that Siakam is almost unique in being able to play both - makes for a plethora of ways and personnel with which Toronto can run the simple yet effective set. This means a whole load of decisions and call-outs for Golden State to make each time. It is very hard to do, no doubt. Yet it is the thing that used to win them championships, and yet it is not there now.
For Game 4, the Warriors clearly came out with a different approach to their pick-and-roll coverage. Having not switched the action much in the first three games - and duly getting burned - the Warriors instead switched the majority of possessions this time around in the hope of better results. It did not work, though, as the switches were not crisp. On multiple occasions, the perimeter defender would go over the screen at the same time that the roll man defender would call for the switch. You cannot do both unless you want to leave the roll man wide open, and Serge Ibaka feasted on it.
The two-time defending champions, then, are discombobulated. They know as well as anyone that a 3-1 lead is reversible, for it was them that the Cleveland Cavaliers did it to back in 2016. But the signs are not good, the momentum entirely against them, and the defence trending the wrong way. The optimistic view says that, if Durant can return for the remainder of the series, there is still a chance. But to be relying on a man who has not played in a month to shore up defensive timing issues is a bad spot to be in.
Game 5 takes place in Toronto in the early hours of Tuesday morning (2am) live on Sky Sports Arena