Do the Toronto Raptors Have a Prayer Against the Cleveland Cavaliers?

Congratulations are in order for the two top seeds in the NBA’s Eastern Conference. 

First to the Toronto Raptors, who booked their first-ever conference finals berth with Sunday’s 116-89 Game 7 victory over the Miami Heat.

But also to the Cleveland Cavaliers, who were long ago penciled in as NBA finalists and now skip the potential headache of “LeBron James vs. embittered former club” headlines. The only thing separating the Cavs from the championship round is a Raptors team that should be thrilled to be there.

Sunday’s contest might have cemented this matchup, but why even play the games, right? 

Toronto is physically worn down after playing consecutive seven-game series and losing its starting center, Jonas Valanciunas, along the way. Meanwhile, Cleveland is remarkably fresh, with back-to-back sweeps to its credit and an empty injury report to its name.

The Cavs’ big three of James, Kyrie Irving and Kevin Love have never played better together, and the team’s perimeter collection is suddenly a record-setting group. Meanwhile, Raptors All-Stars Kyle Lowry and DeMar DeRozan haven’t carried over their regular-season shooting success. They’re still in search of a reliable third scorer since Valanciunas went down.

James hasn’t missed the Finals since 2010. Is a Raptors team that needed all seven games to dispatch the retooling Indiana Pacers and injury-riddled Heat really the club capable of snapping that streak?

Probably not! 

But let’s give this series a chance to breathe before declaring it dead.

The Case for the Raptors

If the Raptors can somehow bottle up what they found in Sunday’s Game 7—the superstar version of Lowry, the aggressive DeRozan, the spacing around the stars, the turbo-charged Bismack Biyombo—and haul it to the next round, they could at least cause some uncomfortable moments in Cleveland.

This stage shouldn’t be an issue for Toronto. Yes, the Raptors entered the playoffs with the yips after back-to-back first-round exits. Their opening series was rarely pretty. But they showed this core can survive and advance.

“Going through the Indiana series helped them tremendously as far as getting through …

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