(Toronto) Fred VanVleet had his first triple-double of his career Friday night in a 37-point performance and the Toronto Raptors came from behind to defeat the helpless Utah Jazz 122- 108.
The fifth consecutive victory, however, started badly. The Raptors scored the first basket and trailed behind, by 17 points to one point in the game. The lead held up to a streak of 15 straight points for the Raptors, all scored by VanVleet in the third quarter to give Toronto the lead 85-84. He totaled 24 points in the third quarter.
In total, VanVleet has scored 17 straight points for the Raptors. That’s one short of the team record held by Vince Carter.
“It’s hard to score that many points, that’s for sure,” said Raptors head coach Nick Nurse. Especially to succeed as many in a row. ”
The Raptors point guard only managed to hit the mark twice in the first half of 11 attempts. However, he made the ropes vibrate during his eight throws in the third quarter.
VanVleet ended his night of work with 10 rebounds and 10 assists.
The Jazz and its balding roster did not find a response in the fourth quarter and lost it 28-16.
“We played very well in the second half. And we had to… I thought playing in an empty arena was going to hit us at some point, especially for the motivation aspect. We couldn’t create our own pleasure in the first half, said Nurse. But in the second half, we had some. ”
Visitors had to do without star pivot Rudy Gobert and winger Joe Ingles, both on COVID-19 protocol and Donovan Mitchell with a back injury.
Each of the Jazz’s starting five was making their first start of the season.
“There is no excuse [pour notre première demie]. There are no bad players in the NBA, VanVleet said. I don’t care where his players come from. It’s a team fighting for the championship and a lot of these players don’t play because of it. They are real NBA players. We didn’t answer the call for the first few minutes and it was difficult to come back afterwards. They had the wind in their sails and we didn’t shoot for a long time. ”
OG Aununoby collected 22 points for the Raptors and Pascal Siakam scored 17. Chris Boucher totaled 13 points in 20 minutes of play and his Quebec counterpart Khem Birch scored 3 points in 17 minutes on the floor.