-A win is a win, but the Toronto Raptors' 128-123 overtime victory over the Philadelphia 76ers was hardly a thing of beauty. Toronto let a 17 point lead evaporate late in the game and were forced to work extra hard for the W on this Saturday afternoon.
-Where to start with this mess? How about Raptors' coach Jay Triano, whose bizarre coaching decisions down the stretch nearly cost Toronto the game. Sonny Weems held the hot hand all afternoon, especially in the third quarter, yet Triano ignored Weems in the fourth, only going back to him for late-game defensive possessions. Instead, Triano opted to run Hedo Turkoglu out there, whose offence was mediocre at best this afteroon, and whose defence was virtually invisible. Triano also elected to stay in the zone, even though Philly's small-ball line-up was shredding it to bits, and finding open looks for 3's.
-As a result, Philly's athletic young scorers like Iguodala, Williams and Holiday wreaked havoc on Toronto's D and nearly got the 76ers the win. Iggy led all scorers with 33 points, while Holiday and Williams had 25 and 12 respectively.
-Toronto was led by Chris Bosh with a nice 28 and 12, with 7 assists thrown in for good measure. However the numbers are a bit misleading as CB4 really only woke up in the second half, and saw his turnover issues return as well. Weems as mentioned was dynamite with 18 points on 9 of 11 shooting, while Bargnani dropped in 23 and Antoine Wright had 15.
-While today's win puts Toronto a game above .500, I'm admittedly finding it incredibly hard to focus on anything else really because outside of Triano's bizarre moves, Toronto played well offensively, and aside from a brutal 19 turnovers, was decent at times on the defensive end. It really should have been enough to secure the victory but for some reason, even after his Yorkville outing, Triano and co's love affair with Hedo continues. Add in some minutes that should probably have gone to Jarrett Jack and Amir Johnson in the fourth, and if I didn't know better, I would have said Triano was doing his best to "out-tank" the 76ers.