Sad news for Toronto Raptor: most harrowing moment in Raptors

Here are 10 takeaways from the Toronto Raptors’ 131-111 Game 1 loss to the Philadelphia 76ers.

One — In short, everything that could have gone wrong did go wrong. The Raptors were overrun in every sense of the word in Game 1, as the Sixers bullied and tricked the Raptors into a shambolic display on the defensive end.

To make matters worse, the Raptors suffered multiple injuries, while having another two players foul out. The Raptors made mini-runs in the third quarter to eat into the lead, but the Sixers had a response every time. The only positives to really take away are that many of their mistakes were uncharacteristic and entirely correctable.

Two — The Raptors need to tighten up their defence or this will be a very short series. Philadelphia scored 131 points on 89 possessions, which ranks as the third-most efficient playoff performance in the last 26 years, according to John Schuhmann of NBA.com. The Raptors predictably sold out to pressure Joel Embiid and James Harden, but this wasn’t a schematic issue.

The Raptors simply made too many mistakes in their execution and got burned for it. Of course, it doesn’t help that the Sixers’ secondary scorers in Tyrese Maxey and Tobias Harris combined for 65 points on 35 shots. The temptation will be to scrap the entire strategy, but the prudent approach is to cut out the inefficiencies. Embiid will always command a double team, and so will Harden to a large degree, but the Raptors have to be much sharper with their timing and rotations. Limiting their stars is only half the battle. It also goes without saying that the Raptors have to be better on the glass, and in transition.