Raptors All-Star Kyle Lowry limped and hobbled around all Sunday night at Barclays Center. Under normal circumstances, he likely would not have been on the floor.
But these are the NBA playoffs, hardly a time known for normalcy.
“We’d probably have got in a fight if I took him out,” Raptors coach Dwane Casey said.
So Lowry played through pain in his right knee. He played through foul trouble — including the last 6:37 of Game 4 of this playoff series with five fouls. And the 6-foot guard played through the Nets’ defenses, hitting perhaps the biggest shot of the game, a sky hook over 6-foot-11 Kevin Garnett with 1:13 left to push the Raptors up six in their eventual 87-79 victory that evened the first-round series at two games apiece.
It looked as if he takes and makes that shot all the time.
“That was the first time this year in a game. I did it in practice like once,” said Lowry who finished with 22 points and was a plus-14 on the floor. “It’s something I work on in the summertime. It came into a situation where it was needed. Kevin Garnett is 6-11, can block shots. I felt like that was a shot I could go to. I felt I was going to make it. I took the shot to be aggressive. It looked good. It felt good. I took the shot to be aggressive.”
And to bury the Nets for the night as Toronto got its first road playoff win since May 6, 2001 in the Eastern Conference semis at Philadelphia. The Raptors had lost 13 straight road playoff games.
“It was a momentum play for us, it was huge,” said Casey. “We knew we had to continue to attack the basket.”
That’s what Lowry did. That’s what the Raptors expect him to do.
“He’s our MVP, man,” said Greivis Vasquez.
For one game, the “V” not only stood for valuable but vulnerable. Lowry still nursed a painful right knee from a twist and a tweak endured Friday night in Game 3. Saturday at practice, he spoke with ice packs on both knees, a stitched lip, and a sore elbow.
But there was no way he would miss this. When he was on the floor, the Raptors surged. When he sat, the Raptors struggled. But he was there when needed. He exemplified what he said was the team’s spirit.
“That’s our team, we’ve got a full team of guys that just want to win,” said Lowry.
Sunday, they grabbed home-court advantage back. Now it is a best-of-3 series — with, if necessary, two games scheduled for Toronto.
“We’re encouraged,” Lowry said. “We go home 2-2. We’re encouraged by that. We put ourselves in a hole by losing Game 1.
“We’ve got to take care of home and home has got to take care of us. We felt we were going to win Friday, we didn’t. We felt we were going to win tonight, we did.”