After watching the Toronto Maple Leafs pull out all the stops to try and creep two points closer to the Philadelphia Flyers, holders of the final playoff spot in the NHL's Eastern Conference, it was dismaying watching the Toronto Raptors play "closies count as a moral victory" against the Los Angeles Lakers in the nightcap NBA game.
The Raptors basically kept the game between six and ten points almost all the way to the finish line. A good performance. In some quarters, ball hog T.J. Ford will be lauded for his indomitable will and 20 plus points. As usual, he took 20 plus shots to get there. Bahh!
What gores my ox was the final two minutes. Trailing by six, the Raptors went inside. Then let the Lakers dribble out a few seconds before fouling lamely. The scene repeated itself three times. Needing three-point buckets, the Raptors (meaning Ford), kept getting the semi-easy two-point shots and then fouling Bryant with all the urgency of a fat man at an all-day buffet.
At NO time in the final three minutes or so, did it look like Toronto was doing anything OTHER than trying to keep it respectable. Whatever the decision-making process, that stinks. I don't care that there is a game tomorrow (actually tonight, now) in San Francisco. I don't care if it was odds on that the Lakers would make their free throws and hold onto the lead. I don't care if it would spoil a really good game-long effort to have a final score with Los Angeles winning by 15-20 points.
Damn the torpedoes, full effort ahead. The best 3-point shooting club in the league should have been giving it the old long-distance try. Trading three for two (and the occasional one) was the only way to win. They just didn't try.
And that stinks.
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