Three Things to Watch in Game 7: Toronto and Indiana Edition

The Toronto Raptors will attempt to stave off embarrassment, for the third postseason in a row, while the Indiana Pacers will try to keep irrelevance at arm’s length as both teams work to make it into the second round via a Game 7 performance on Sunday night. With the stakes in place, we decided to dive into three basketball rings that could make a difference.

1. Kyle Lowry

We’re all aware that DeMar DeRozan is taking 17.7 shots on his way toward 15.8 points per game in the playoffs. We know that Toronto center Jonas Valanciunas has been alternately dominant and dormant based mostly around whether or not the Pacers decide to call out their switches. We get that Norman Powell is a rookie and that, apparently via the terms of his contract, Terrence Ross is not allowed to play basketball in April.

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Kyle Lowry is the key. He’s made fewer than a third of his shots since messing up his elbow a month ago, he dribbles far more with his left hand than we’re used to, and he’s fading to the side on jumpers. Lowry is shooting just 31 percent on the series, and though his Pacer counterpart George Hill is a heady defender, this isn’t all on the Indiana schemes. Lowry is clearly not the same player that helped push Toronto to the East’s second-best record.

One shouldn’t expect it, but even badly-injured players can have a turnaround game. Lowry doesn’t even have to hit from outside or post up his rangy opponent in Hill close to the hoop – he can work that famed inside-out dribble on his way to double-digit free throw attempts or help save broken plays.

Any little bit helps. Kyle Lowry, in a Raptor career full of looking over his shoulder (more on that later) should know as much.

2. The Pine

Indiana’s bench in Game 6? It wasn’t bad!

It had little to do with the team’s eventual blowout win, but it also kept things from turning completely laughable as the Pacers clung to what turned into a four-point deficit heading into halftime.

Solomon Hill, out of nowhere, has turned into what Indianapolis wanted Derrick McKey to be for years – a guy that could actually hit a three-pointer from the corner. Hill has nailed 8-10 from long range over his last three games, and that’s not counting the three-pointer he missed that would have turned Game 5 on its ear. Ty Lawson, clearly a man who doesn’t know any Pacer plays beyond calling for a screen, helped circle the wagons in the first half during the team’s Game 6 win, and Toronto’s Cory Joseph is likely feeling his oats after a 4-6 showing from the field on Friday.

Meanwhile, Pacer-killer Bismack Biyombo is readying his aim following a 10-rebound performance off the bench in Game 6, mindful of both his abilities against Indiana and his eventual massive free agent contract that is set to hit in two months’ time.

Both squads tightened the rotations in Game 6, with coaches fearful and nervous about a season gone batty. Slots six-to-eight on Sunday could and hopefully should keep things interesting.

3. History

It’s stupid, but this is where we are. And the Raptors have only themselves to blame.

When Toronto lined up against the New York Knicks in 2001, they were staring down NBA orthodoxy. The year prior, the team went down in a blaze of embarrassment as news of coach Butch Carter’s lawsuit against former Raptor Marcus Camby hit the fish and chip papers. Camby happened to be playing for the New York Knicks at the time, and his Knicks (coming off of a trip to the Finals 10 months before) dutifully downed the Raps in the team’s first postseason appearance.

A year later those same Knicks featured Mark Jackson as starting point guard, a former Knick that the Raptors signed during the 2000 offseason to lend some veteran credibility to the squad. Jackson’s time in Toronto only took to sour midway through the season, pushing the Raptors to deal him to an Atlantic division rival at the trade deadline. At that point in league history, apprenticeship was law – the Pistons had to sweat the Celtics, the Bulls had to work through the Pistons, the Lakers had to deal with three straight sweeps – and it was assumed that the Raptors were working on the same schedule as they squared up with New York for the second straight season.

Instead, Toronto tossed the aging Knicks to the curb. Toronto was one missed jumper away from making it to the Eastern finals, and in downing the Knicks it shoved a finger to the face of every similarly-aging sportswriter when it re-signed all of its major rotation keys (including Vince Carter) while adding Hakeem Olajuwon during the offseason.

That turn didn’t work out, neither did the next dozen (or next two), and Toronto hasn’t been in the second round since.

A Game 7 loss, to a Pacer team that needed until the last three days of the regular season to assure its postseason berth, would be a killer. Caveats would abound – a debilitating injury to a team’s best player is nothing to dismiss – but the pins would set in. General manager Masai Ujiri inherited his (very good) coach, and most of this roster; he could use a loss as an excuse to break things up. No teams have let the odds down more than these Raptors over the last three postseasons. Only one other team (Milwaukee) will have gone as long without a playoff series win, in a league that shoves over half of its teams into the postseason.

This is to say, there will be some burning takes. And, for once, they might be on point.

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Kelly Dwyer is an editor for Ball Don’t Lie on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at [email protected] or follow him on Twitter! Follow @KDonhoops