After being held at bay in their last two games, the Toronto Raptors found their way back to victory with a 117-111 win over the Houston Rockets on Friday night at the Toyota Center.
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Led on offense by Fred VanVleet (32 points) and Gary Trent Fils (28 points), the Torontonians scored 55 points in the first half against the worst team in the NBA Western Conference.
The Texan team never gave up and recorded 39 points in the fourth quarter. However, the Rockets failed to complete their comeback.
Houston was without one of its best players in the game, guard Jalen Green, who sustained a calf injury.
With this win, the Queen City team is one game away from the Indiana Pacers and 12th in the Eastern table.
Nick Nurse’s charges will wrap up their seven-game road trip on Sunday by heading to Tennessee to take on the Memphis Grizzlies.
The Pacers got hot
The Pacers and Sacramento Kings battled it out at Gainbridge Fieldhouse, and the Indiana team eventually came out on top 107-104.
Lithuania’s Domantas Sabonis played a first game against his former Pacers teammates. He was traded from the Pacers to the Kings for Tyrese Haliburton on February 9, 2022. Before the game, the Indiana organization paid tribute to the man who wore the Pacers uniform for five seasons from 2017 to 2022.
Quebec’s Bennedict Mathurin recovered well from a five-point underperformance the previous day. The 20-year-old had 14 points and four rebounds in 28 minutes on the court.
Free for all in Minneapolis
At the Target Center, the Orlando Magic beat the Minnesota Timberwolves 127-120, but it wasn’t the result of the game that caught the eye.
A free-for-all erupted near the away bench near the end of the third quarter.
After seeing two Magic players taunt his failed attempt from downtown, fullback Austin Rivers landed several shots at Mo Bamba.
Youngster Jalen Suggs came to his defense by knocking Rivers down, drawing the wrath of ‘T-Wolves’ fans.
At the end of this scuffle, five players were expelled from the meeting. Bamba and Suggs were sidelined at Magic, while Rivers, Jaden McDaniels and Taurean Prince suffered the same fate at the hosts.