Scottie Barnes & Jonathan Mogbo co-star in Raptors first win of the ...

Before the game tipped off, Darko Rajakovic talked to media about maintaining defensive intensity and pressure. He talked about what a let down the season opener against Cleveland was, and said the team planned to bring much more to the table in the looming matchup vs. the 76ers. Well done in that regard. Rajakovic also mentioned how high a standard Scottie Barnes holds himself to, and expected a significant change from last game.

I’ll update the piece with quotes as they roll in.

The Raptors were facing a much worse team (due to injuries) in this one, but they’re still a team that is battling a handful of injuries themselves. Immanuel Quickley was out (and won’t even make the trip to Minneapolis tomorrow night), RJ Barrett was close, but still out. Bruce Brown, Kelly Olynyk, Ja’Kobe Walter – the list goes on. They needed that start from Barnes. They got that plus more from his good friend.

“He’s kind of a push guard who wants to enforce the pace and get in the paint. He’s unselfish. He creates a lot of offense, not for himself but for others, too.” Nick Nurse told me pregame about Barnes. “I know he had a really tough night the other night in the opener. It seemed to me that he was really playing hard, but it was just one of those nights where the lid was on the basket for him. I wouldn’t expect that to happen tonight in this one.”

Barnes dunked over two 76ers (including one Kyle Lowry) to start the game off for the Raptors, which acted as a punctuation of sorts to announce that the team would be bringing a lot more intensity in this one. The opening didn’t betray the middle or the end. The Raptors brought their hardhats. A huge part of that extra grit and gumption was Jonathan Mogbo. It wasn’t limited to him as we saw gritty possessions from Jamison Battle (who fouled out in 14 minutes) to Jamal Shead, to Chris Boucher — who gave his life to some defensive stops, man — to DJ Carton, but Mogbo brought it.

What’s been asked of Mogbo isn’t easy. He’d already built himself into an unbelievable basketball player — if you get drafted into the NBA, you are without a doubt one of the world’s best players — and upon being drafted, so much of what he did to find success on the court was handwaved away. Awkward summer league minutes, confusion in preseason, but still trying. Mogbo was a small-ball big in college. A maestro of delay action, and a physical marvel in his conference. The Raptors selected him with the 31st overall pick and immediately asked him to think about doing everything different. That’s still the plan, of course, to expand his game and play him a lot of different places on the court, but on a late October night, Mogbo got to return to the familiar: and it was awesome.

“Obviously in college he played a completely different role. A 5-man, rolling, being a lob threat. ” Rajakovic said of Mogbo post game. “Some of those tools he’s still able to use. Now he’s doing more pushing the ball, spacing the floor, and still learning when to cut, when to pull it, when to shoot the ball. We really need to explore a lot of his defensive ability and what he’s able to do there.”

12 points, 9 rebounds, 5 assists, 2 steals and 3 blocks and the team leader in plus-minus (+21) is a lot of damage in 23 minutes. In a lower scoring game, to boot. Mogbo was a real gamechanger.

Mogbo was ruthless attacking the glass, creating extra possession after extra possession. With Joel Embiid out of this game and Andre Drummond playing a more featured role, this was an opportunity to battle against one of the best for some possessions and pummel the likes of Guerschon Yabusele on the others. Endless energy and boundless second jumps to keep the ball alive and chase it down. He was a great compliment to Jakob Poeltl – who was also a damn good, professional big man in this one, bossing the paint throughout the whole game and finishing enough plays to keep the offense going.

To be fair to Mogbo as well, it wasn’t necessarily that he wasn’t doing any wing stuff, because he put in a hell of a shift as a point-of-attack defender in this one. A steal after blitzing a ball screen with Barnes, a block on a Tyrese Maxey pull-up jumper while guarding in isolation. Chopping feet, sliding them, work, work, work; run to the other end, catch, survey, move off ball, read the defense, slide into the dunker spot, catch, dunk. A basketball player playing basketball. Of course he made some high post reads and was more than capable working out of DHO’s, but he found his way to a lot of utility out there and it wasn’t all big man stuff.

“If a matchup comes and my name is called to guard somebody, I’m gonna be the first one to want that assignment.” Mogbo told me after the game. “I feel like I can do a good job with it using my versatility, my length and my athleticism. I feel like I can guard a lot of positions.”

Battle deserves a mention as well, with his absurdly fun performance. It’s not often that a wing fouls out in 14 minutes, and it’s not often that wing pours in 12 points and 6 rebounds while doing so. He was note perfect as a shooter for the Raptors. They need shooting desperately, he takes about .2 seconds to heat up the oven, and boom, minutes – and good ones at that. He was awesome. And where Battle was all 3-pointers, Ochai Agbaji pitched in from the wing in the way that his best games look like – with run-outs in transition, sly cuts to the bucket; and true to his early season form, much improved finishing. All that and a pinch of good defense was enough for the wings to fight their way to the finish.

Pacing the Raptors all throughout was Barnes, though. His calm, his ability to grind for buckets and create for others, that’s what helped put the Raptors over the top. Along with a couple really slick drives to the bucket from Lowry-in-training, Shead. Barnes’ incredible ability to march through the paint, through contact, and find the bucket on the other side of things – that was massive in this game.

“It was great. That’s my guy. Definitely fun.” Mogbo said of sharing the win and a starring performance with his friend, Barnes. “We know how to control our emotions on the court, but after it’s a celebration, it’s basketball.”

There was a huge roar of celebration heard from the Raptors locker room shortly before the fellas came out for media availability.

The guards guarded enough to figure it out, and the bigs put them over the top. The Raptors found their way to the first win of the season. Great game.

Have a blessed day.