P.J. Tucker added eight points and 12 rebounds.
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His defence on Butler was spectacular. Lopez claims that prior to the rebound, Ibaka threw him a nasty elbow which is why he reacted the way he did. “When you have good, crisp ball movement, you’re going to get open looks”.
Fred VanVleet cut the lead to two points with a layup as the home crowd roared the Raptors on.
Lopez and Ibaka were both ejected and issued technical fouls after yesterday’s incident. That’s what you’ve got to have.
Robin Lopez, a player for the Chicago Bulls and twin brother of Brooklyn Nets player Brook Lopez, got into a scuffle with Serge Ibaka on Tuesday night. Pascal Siakam has been recalled from the D-League for additional depth, and there will be more minutes for Patrick Patterson at the four and for Jakob Poeltl or Lucas Nogueira in the traditional backup center role, one Ibaka has primarily been occupying, especially late in games.
Raptors coach Dwane Casey was happy with his team’s performance regardless of the result.
Since there hasn’t been any recent precedent for fights with punches thrown in an National Basketball Association game, many were unsure of how many games Ibaka would miss as penalty. I think that’s all you can play about that. “I’m not too surprised [that it escalated]”.
“It felt like nobody had any hold on [Ibaka]”, Lopez said. But with Lopez’s (expected) suspension pending, he can no longer mask the fact that this team is unbalanced and bound to miss the playoffs. “Who knows. I’m pulling for Ibaka, though”.
Recently, though, they’ve been getting up more of them, and connecting on a higher percentage as well.
Chicago’s collective decision to go small was exacerbated by trading Taj Gibson and Doug McDermott – whose replacements Cameron Payne, Anthony Morrow and Joffrey Lauvergne totaled six minutes of action in Toronto. The Raptors forward retaliated with a right hand of his own that clipped Lopez’s left ear.
DeRozan agreed with a reporter that it was one of his most impressive defensive plays ever.
After a Chicago bucket in the teams’ Tuesday-night tilt, Lopez lost his balance and stumbled backward into Ibaka.
“I’ve heard about it through multiple people; people were telling me about it during the game”, Brook said. “I thought he was a big part of what they did building that dynasty back in the ’90s and early 2000s”.
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The discipline marks the first time a Raptor has been suspended by the league since Amir Johnson sat one game for throwing his mouthpiece at referee David Jones in Portland in December, 2012.
