Three Thoughts: Shot Making, Playing Smart, Adjustments

The Raptors are in desperate need of a victory in Game 3 against the Boston Celtics. Expect adjustments to be made as Toronto hopes for its shots to fall

The Toronto Raptors are in pretty dire straights tonight, down 2-0 to the Boston Celtics, and playing in what is essentially a do-or-die Game 3.

No team in NBA history has ever come back from a 3-0 deficit and I wouldn't expect that to change on Saturday if Toronto loses tonight.

So what now?

1: Shot Making

It's might sound a little obvious, but so far this series has at least partially come down to the Celtics' ability to make shots and the Raptors' inability to do the same.

Through two games, the Raptors are shooting 26.3% from 3-point range while the Celtics are shooting 37.9% from beyond the arc. For Toronto, that's well below the Raptors' season average, and a lot of that has had to do with missed 3s from Fred VanVleet and Kyle Lowry. If the Raptors' two guards continue to miss shots while Boston's Marcus Smart connects at a 55% clip, Toronto is going to lose.

2: Playing Smart

The aforementioned Smart has been red-hot through the first two games of the series and almost single-handedly won the Celtics Game 2 with five straight 3-pointers in the fourth quarter.

Coming into the series, I wrote about how the Raptors would let Smart shoot as a means of forcing the ball out of the hands of Boston's better scorers. So far the Raptors have done exactly that, trying to limit others while surrendering 3-pointers to Smart who has taken the most 3s of any Celtics player in the series.

On paper, it was — and arguably still is — the wise strategy considering Smart was a below-average 3-point shooter during the regular season and a bad 3-point shooter on catch-and-shoot 3s during the year. But in a best-of-seven series, anything can happen and all the number crunching doesn't really matter if Smart gets hot.

How Toronto defends Smart in Game 3 and maybe more importantly how Smart responds to the Raptors' defence might decide who wins Game 3.

3: Making Adjustments

The Raptors had some success in Game 2 with their Fred VanVleet-Pascal Siakam two-man game. The idea behind the play is to get Boston's Kemba Walker onto Pascal Siakam, creating a mismatch the Raptors can exploit either with Siakam attacking or playmaking when help comes.

In the final seconds of the game, the Celtics put Walker on OG Anunoby and Smart on VanVleet so that when VanVleet came to set a screen for Siakam, it was Smart switching onto Siakam instead of Walker. That play ended with the controversial no-call and Siakam fumbling the ball out-of-bounds when Smart stripped him.

If the Celtics keep Walker on VanVleet, I'd expect to see more of VanVleet setting screens for Siakam in Game 3, otherwise it'll be on the 6-foot-7 Anunoby to take advantage against the undersized Walker.