TORONTO — The best teams often have the shortest memories.
Always focused on the next play or the next game as not to dwell on the moment — high or low — and risk making mountains out of molehills.
Undoubtedly one of many clichés in basketball, but for good reason.
The Toronto Raptors have been steadfast in that approach through all their ups and downs through the first quarter of the 2025-26 season.
“You want to have your focus on execution, on preparation, on things that you really control. Winning is not in your control,” Raptors head coach Darko Rajakovic explained pre-game on Friday. “There are so many things that are out there that can happen … So that’s why coaches are really trying to focus on that process of improving the product night in and night out.”
Controlling the “work” as Rajakovic later described is what ensured the Raptors didn’t fall off the tracks entirely after a 1-4 start or crash too hard when their bullet train of momentum — a.k.a. a nine-game win streak, tied for third-longest in franchise history — came to an abrupt stop with back-to-back losses.
And that mindset is exactly what they’ll need to rely on after falling to the Charlotte Hornets on Friday night to drop to 15-9 on the season, just 24 hours removed from losing on a buzzer-beater orchestrated by franchise tormentor LeBron James.
“We always talk about we want to be a winning team, we want to win every single night, we want to compete every single night. But if you put winning as your primary objective and goal, then you’re losing focus on details that really lead to winning or losing games,” the third-year bench boss explained when asked bout his team’s continued mindset before they fell 111-86 in a season-low scoring performance.
Aside from the wins and losses, what else hasn’t been in the Raptors’ control is a dogged schedule that’s had the team play five games in seven nights, including a pair of back-to-backs.
“Physically we were worn down,” Rajakovic said post-game after his team shot just 37 per cent from the field, marking the fourth time in the Raptors’ last five games (each losses) the team has converted under 50 per cent. “I’m really proud of our guys tonight. I really thought that we tried, but when you’re trying and you’re missing layups, you’re missing wide-open shots, it’s hard to keep it up.
“But I think we did an outstanding job. We did not quit. We continued fighting and fighting and fighting. We just did not have enough in the tank tonight.”
If there was one player who had any “juice” on Friday night, as the Raptors bench boss described, it was Immanuel Quickley, who finished with a season-high 31 points on 11-of-22 shooting from the field and 4-of-10 from deep.
A fitting performance from the player who has most routinely echoed Rajakovic’s mantras of short-term memory — undoubtedly a factor in the lead guard’s turnaround after starting the season averaging just 13.3 points on 50.0 per cent true shooting during October.
Quickley’s hot night at Scotiabank Arena began as early as the opening frame, scoring seven consecutive points by muscling his way into the paint for a layup and a couple free throws, with an above-the-break triple sandwiched in between as the Raptors sauntered to a 24-18 lead.
“You really need to be able to be in the moment and be present, whether you win or not, the 26-year-old said after the loss. “The process is the most important … you have to take everything, the highs, the lows, the good and the bad.”
Quickley’s highs continued throughout the opening half as he followed up a seven-point first quarter with seven more in the second, none more important than a banked-in floater at the 5:01 mark that quelled a near-five-minute scoreless drought — while surrendering a 17-0 run — from the Raptors, eerily reminiscent of their late-game collapse in Charlotte a week prior.
Toronto finished with just 42 first-half points on a ghastly 38.6 per cent shooting from the field, after scoring 40 in the third quarter against the Los Angeles Lakers a night earlier.
Still, Quickley led the ultimately futile rally, chipping in another 12 points in the third as he helped cut an 11-point halftime deficit to 78-70 heading into the final frame. Backing up Quickley in the rallying effort was his, well, backup Jamal Shead, who scored seven of his nine points on the night in the third quarter — before darting a pass to Jamison Battle for a left-corner three to make it a single-digit ball game once more.
That would be Battle’s only consequential moment of the game as the sharpshooter was later ruled out due to a left-ankle sprain. Rajakovic noted post-game that imaging on the injury returned clear and that Battle would be deemed “day-to-day at this point.”
Meanwhile, Quickley’s final punch came on a floater to stop a 9-0 run from the oppositition three minutes into the fourth quarter, but it was clear the Hornets — after rookie Kon Knueppel immediately responded with a left-wing triple en route to 21 points — weren’t going to return the favour of blowing a double-digit fourth-quarter lead as the Raptors did a week ago.
The Raptors have now lost four of their last five outings, looking more like the team that stumbled in October (2-4) than the one that soared in November (12-3). They likely fall somewhere in between come end of season as their third-place standing in the Eastern Conference appears to indicate.
Regardless of the outcome or recent struggles, Rajakovic remained committed to what his team’s mindset ought to be moving forward.
“It’s a long season. The only thing that we do control is our work,” he explained. “Hopefully over here in the next couple of weeks we’re going to have an opportunity to practise a little bit, to really clean up some of the things… but always the answer is the work.”
• B.I. in need of R-and-R?: The Raptors’ leading scorer has looked like a shell of himself lately, averaging 18.3 points over his last six games on 44.8 per cent true shooting — both well below his season averages. And although neither he nor the team have turned to the schedule as an excuse (vocalizing as much previously), Friday night’s 3-of-13 showing for a season-low seven points made it hard to think otherwise.
That fatigue could also be attributed to the fact Ingram has yet to sit a game out for the Raptors, with his 23 games in two months already well past his 18 appearances in all of last season.
• More minutes for Mogbo: Sophomore forward Jonathan Mogbo is sure to need an ice bath after Friday night, considering when he checked in for four minutes at the end, it marked his third separate basketball game in the last 24 hours — four in three days if we’re counting Wednesday.
After logging five minutes against the Lakers on Thursday, Mogbo got a couple of hours of rest before suiting up and starting for the Raptors 905, Toronto’s G League affiliate, on Friday morning — logging 26 minutes.
“Just doing everything. You know, downhills, attacking closeouts, point-five decisions,” Mogbo said after helping the Raptors 905 to a record-tying 10th consecutive win, amid their perfect start to the G League season. “Just going out there having fun and just playing my game and having confidence. That’s the most important thing.”
Rajakovic added that Mogbo’s stretch of play has been “amazing,” and the second-year forward’s effort is indicative of him grasping the “opportunity to work on our craft.”
“The G League, a lot of the times, makes the difference between the guys that really love the game of basketball, and some guys that are just like … trying to figure out if they can have a spot on some NBA roster,” Rajakovic added of Mogbo, who entered Friday averaging 21.0 points, 8.3 rebounds and 3.7 steals on 65.6 per cent shooting over his last three games with the Raptors 905.
“So, you can see a lot, how guys are approaching the games at the G League level, you can really see who is about the right values.”
