Raptors vs. Rockets, Knicks Dec. 22, 23 Takeaways: Keeping the glass half-full

Walter, Shead, Boucher provided bright spots

Eight straight losses. Seven wins from 30 games. Jakob Poeltl out. Immanuel Quickley out. I don’t know if Bruce Brown is reconditioning for the 2024-25 NBA season or the 2028 Olympics. It’s a dark tunnel if you enter it.

It is the holiday season, though, and in keeping with that spirit, there’s some good to be enjoyed about this team right now. The takeaways are going to focus more on the Rockets game than the Knicks because of the blowout nature of the latter. Let’s get to it:

The Ja’Kobe Show

Ja’Kobe Walter was on fire from downtown against the Rockets, scoring the first 14 Raptors points of the game including four triples — the last of which made Matt Devlin hysterical.

The 20-year-old finished the game with a career-high 27 points including six triples in just 28 minutes. It was really cool to see him pop off like this, and probably not something one could see coming considering his inefficiency through both college and 16 NBA games thus far.

There is no doubting Walter plays with a fire in his belly and is a true competitor. Even though the 3-point shot was falling, it was good to see him still look for ways to attack the basket. He plays with a natural flow, happy to ride his hot hand when he had a good look but consistently looking for gaps and driving lanes to attack as well.

He did have 10 free-throw attempts against the Knicks which is cool to see on the surface but bear in mind that six of those attempts came in the final four minutes of garbage time.

We’re all Sheadheads

Unfortunately, Jamal Shead didn’t play against the Knicks due to a right knee contusion. He was, however, fantastic against the Rockets.

Shead finished with 11 points, 10 assists, two steals and a block in that one, playing 33 strong minutes in the absence of Davion Mitchell. After labouring through the month of November, the rookie is showing signs of life again with three decent to good games on the bounce.

He looks quite comortable playing alongside Kelly Olynyk, a spacing big perhaps better helping bring out the best in Shead’s playmaking ability. I think in his first year he’s going to have stretches that are up and down and that’s perfectly natural. Shead would’ve had a little extra juice for this one considering the relationship he’s been able to form with Fred VanVleet and the opportunity to go up against him.

Darko’s tanking masterclass

Time and again this season, Darko Rajakovic has made decisions that are head scratching in real time but bang on the money when considering the bigger picture.

His challenge usage has been among the most questionable, and deciding to use one in the second quarter on a 50-50 call when the Raptors were up eight against the Rockets is right up there. In the moment you’re thinking, hey, your team has a lead against one of the stronger Western conference teams so maybe save it for a better moment or at least a call you can challenge with greater certainty.

Instead, the challenge was used and lost, and when the ball bounced off Jae’Sean Tate late but the referee awarded the ball to the Rockets, there was no challenge available to alter a call that would have certainly gone in favour of the Raptors.

Rajakovic knows he’s being assessed on development this season, and increasing the lottery odds will be something that will be appreciated more on draft night.

Boucher performs on both ends of B2B

Chris Boucher scored 31 points on 11-of-17 shooting across both games against the Rockets and Knicks, looking extremely engaged and active.

There was a fun wrinkle in New York, as Vince Carter revealed on the broadcast that he had a good chat with Boucher about his follow through and hoped to see him maintain the follow through on his jumper more consistently moving forward.

Boucher shot 4-of-5 from deep against the Knicks, so perhaps Carter is a “shot doctor” as Matt Devlin joked. What was more fun than the shot was seeing some of the fun passes that the 31-year-old vet was able to stitch together against the Rockets:

Notes

• With Immanuel Quickley yet to resume contact in practice, it’s hard to envision him returning for at least another couple weeks. Perhaps he’s circled Jan. 8 against his former team in New York but that’s pure speculation.

• Jakob Poeltl remains day-to-day and with Memphis being the only game over the next five days I could see the team giving him that night off as well.

• The back-to-back losses have now dropped the Raptors to third-worst in the league, a game worse than Utah and a half-game worse than Charlotte.