TORONTO — Turning the ball over on an inbounds pass was bad enough, but the greater indignity for Boston Celtics forward Marcus Morris might have been having to hear about it from Drake, the Toronto Raptors superfan.
Morris was attempting to inbound the ball near Drake’s front-row seats early in the second quarter Wednesday when Lucas Nogueira poked the ball away from Greg Monroe as he attempted to receive Morris’ pass. Drake, a rapper when he isn’t barking at Raptors opponents, sprang to his feet as play went the other way and Nogueira finished a trailing dunk after taking an over-the-head flip from Delon Wright.
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Lucas Nogueira steals the Celtics’ inbounds pass and, at the other end, rises up for a two-handed dunk that gets Drake out of his chair.
As the Celtics came back up the floor, Drake could be seen shouting in Morris’ direction and appeared to say, “What did I just tell you, man?” — suggesting that he might have predicted the inbounds miscue.
The injury-ravaged Celtics, thin on healthy point guards, turned the ball over nine times in the second quarter and 17 times overall. The Raptors scored more points off turnovers (17) in the second quarter than Boston scored total points (13) in the frame.
The Raptors used that second-quarter thievery to emerge with a 96-78 triumph at the Air Canada Centre that all but ensures Toronto the No. 1 seed in the Eastern Conference playoffs.
“[Drake] said little things, but I think he does that all the time with everybody. It was nothing crazy,” Morris said. “He’s being a fan. That’s his team. So I respect it.”
With the win, the Raptors own a three-game lead over Boston with four games to play. They also earned a season split of the four-game series. The Raptors would own the head-to-head tiebreaker with Boston because of their superior conference record.
One night after committing 17 turnovers in a game in which it did not have a single pure ball handler available due to injuries, the Celtics again struggled to take care of the ball. The second quarter featured one face palm-worthy stretch in which the Celtics went more than five minutes without a field goal and turned the ball over six times.
The Celtics were hoping that the return of Terry Rozier, who missed his first game of the season Tuesday in Milwaukee because of an ankle injury, would stabilize the point guard position after the team was forced to start G League two-way player Kadeem Allen there against the Bucks.
Instead, the Celtics routinely gave the ball away in live-ball situations. A Raptors team that scored a mere 14 first-quarter points on 6-of-23 shooting was more than happy to feast on easy transition points.
When the Celtics beat the Raptors on Saturday in Boston, their sixth straight victory in a stretch that improbably sustained their quest for the top seed, they turned the ball over just six times while yielding a mere two points off turnovers.
“You always talk on offense about owning your space, and they owned our space all night,” Celtics coach Brad Stevens said. “They were very physical. They were very good. I thought that we had unbelievable defensive mentality and the way we were playing was terrific on that end. It’s hard to keep playing that way when you’re not making baskets — or at least occasionally making one.
“The only reason we were down at halftime was the turnovers, even though we couldn’t score. I think, ultimately, that probably wore on us. And they did a great job. They’re really good, they’re really deep. Hats off.”
DeMar DeRozan led four Raptors in double figures Wednesday with a team-high 16 points. Wright finished with 8 points, 9 rebounds and 8 assists off the Toronto bench.
Raptors fans can exhale a bit after the team lost five of the previous eight games, including back-to-back losses to Boston and Cleveland, their closest competitors atop the East.
“To be a good team, that’s how you’ve got to respond,” DeRozan said. “When you have games like we had [Tuesday against Cleveland], to be able to understand, you know, let’s tighten it up, understand our mistakes and come out the next night and handle business.”
Morris scored a game-high 21 points on 7-of-14 shooting, and Monroe added 17 points while also coming off the Boston bench.
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