Thon Maker isn’t around to sorta kinda expose Jonas Valanciunas’ weaknesses anymore, so in theory he should be good to get reinserted into the starting lineup for the Raptors. Ignore the first game of this series, where he actually did get the start and was ignored just like always. As we saw tonight, a properly utilized and engaged Valanciunas can do some pretty serious damage against a Cavs team whose only rim protector is some made-up entity supposedly called “Edy Tavares”.
At least, the Val-man was properly utilized in the first half, where he had 19 points. As usual, I let myself get a little overexcited about the prospects of him having his first career 40-point game, but that excitement quickly dwindled into nothing but fleeting sensations of non-sadness as the second half went along. Luckily, I hadn’t gotten myself excited about the prospects of the Raptors winning a game this series; I knew that any team that didn’t totally sweep the Bucks would find themselves getting swept themselves.
Still, 23 points is really good for this year’s version of Valanciunas who is absolutely 100 percent despised by Coach Casey. He only scored that many THREE times in the regular season! God, he needs to get to a new team really quickly before his career is completely ruined.