Toronto Raptors Media Availability | Postgame vs. Indiana Pacers | February 14, 2024

Toronto Raptors Media Availability | Postgame vs. Indiana Pacers | February 14, 2024

Against old teammates you had a bit more time on Pascal and Pascal on you than a few of them what was what was it like to play him um kind of weird um you know emotional you know seeing his um thing at the top um you know it was emotional but you

Know we both really good competitors and you know we both want to win and we we going take it to the floor every time we step on the floor uh real competitive today uh it felt amazing though um they were real competitive we was real competitive um we both teams just really

Want to win I know the you know obviously not the result you wanted it’s did you guys need a perform an effort a performance like that to go into Allstar break feeling a bit better about yourself um we didn’t get the result we wanted but you know we played

Hard throughout the whole game uh ran the floor really well um getting easy buckets and transition uh getting to the paint moving the ball got a lot of assists U we knocked down some shots but you know we were still moving the ball and trying to get to the spots we really

Wanted to be all on on the floor um you know we just got to keep getting better each and every single day uh and try to win that’s the ultimate goal at the end of the day how much your intention coming into the game was to sort of

Really get to the basket get to the paint early and kind of set it on maybe a bit um they’re a fast-paced team uh they give up some a lot of points in the paint um we already knew that so you know we just want to attack run in

Transition uh try to get easy ones as possible we want to start off the game strong and throughout the whole game that’s that’s what our attack was uh just keep trying to run in transition uh keep getting easy paint Touches for kickouts um move the ball that was our

Main goal how do you balance sort of your decision- making when it’s you know do you come in looking to pass on a specific play versus looking sort of to take it yourself and score depends on how the defense is if they help I’m looking at pass if they don’t help

Looking to get to the rim uh just try to make the right read every single time when I come down the floor have you given yourself much chance to think about playing your first B start game think about it probably um tonight you know focus on the season

Right now but you know we got some time off so probably think about it tonight um still surreal to me still crazy um it’s crazy uh yeah playing all game you know it’s a dream I guess um I really thought about but you know it’s a dream

I guess um but you know I’m just so happy I’m blessed um I’m excited to go all there Indy uh see a lot of people I know you know I’ve been to the Mickey sophomore game the past two years and I I had an amazing experience um so being we playing allstar game

Already know it’s going to be exciting it’s going to be a fun weekend just enjoy it soak it in um be with family for my first allar game um so it’s going to be a good get together have some friends out there and then you just see

So many faces that you don’t really see throughout the whole season people in the NBA that you know uh that does the stuff behind the scenes that you know I’ve seen since I was in at a draft combine so get to see those guys um see

So many people out there it’s going it’s going to be a fun experience get to see everybody that does the work behind the scenes and things like that as well certainly got a good bounce back effort those last couple minutes couple of Mis communicate Miss plays there just not be

Able to finish off close game again I mean um I thought that they competed on a high level uh throughout the course of of whole game um there at the end a couple of uh possessions that they could finish a little bit different to to get

Uh better look maybe uh but um I thought that we also in last five minutes got uh three wide open threes that which is which is we missed you know if we made one of those it would be completely different story uh on the last play uh

We were looking for for uh uh for a three um I think that uh watching our film now I think that that pass was probably there but which is that we did not execute it the way we wanted on that play um congrats to to uh Indiana uh

They they found a way to close the game talk EXC me Scotty being more assertive he look s looked like he was looking to score right from the start and got in the paint pretty much any time he wanted to that’s the kind of downhill play you

Want from him absolutely we want him to be dominant player like that but he also had eight assists and and 12 rebounds tonight uh we need Scotty who’s going to be playing with that kind of force does not matter who who the opponent is and uh this was a great experience for him

To bounce back from the last game and to to to to have a chance to compare what those two games look like and um I thought that he that that he did really good job to do today I thought that quick was uh much better balanced game

Uh I was hoping that he was going to get a couple more shots uh but he was so focused of of trying to get to the rim and then then scor in paint but overall another good game from him as well you’ve been talking about Chris gu’s professionalism through these last few

Weeks as he’s been out of the rotation is this a good example of of what you were talking about just kind of taking it coming in taking advantage of that opportunity uh absolutely and uh Chris bushe is a young player 31 years old veteran and uh uh that’s um he’s putting

The work in he’s great in play groups uh we had great conversation last couple of days of expectations from him um I still want more from him I still want him to be uh more disciplined in in some defensive uh execution there that we talked about during the game and that’s

Going to be great challenge for him going forward how he can improve in those areas but definitely Chris is a player that can step on a floor and and and help us Scotty in that fourth quarter before he got on the court was standing up a lot on the bench calling

Out coverage as it looked like you talked about the bounce back on the court did that feel like a bounce back off the court from him absolutely um it did he he had a great voice with with the whole team today he was uh lifting his teammates we talked about it uh you

Know it’s it’s going to be right it’s going to be Journey like I don’t expect from him to be perfect but I expect him to learn from his mistakes and those not to make the same mistakes I want him to make a different mistake and to learn

From that one and get better and to get another mistake and learn from that one and move forward and uh I have a feel that that uh Scotty’s heart is in the right place and that he wants to to be exactly that so with 20 32 years old

There is just bunch of opportunities for him to grow as a leader as a player as a man as a brother as a son all of that there was a lovely video tribute for Pascal cakam pregame how do you manage your team’s emotions after a player on

The visiting team gets you know a big Ovation from the fans and you know it could be a distraction um me personally I did not feel it as a distraction I I felt it as omage to uh to our friend and ex teammate uh you know so everybody this organization players

Coaches everybody have have a lot of love and a lot of respect for for uh cakam you know so I don’t think that that created any kind of like emotions that could get in our focus of the game thanks for watching the Toronto rappers YouTube channel check out our latest

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Raptors’ coach and player speak with the media following the Raptors’ 127-125 loss to the Indiana Pacers on Wednesday.

0:00 Scottie Barnes
3:34 Darko Rajakovic

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