#lineup-experimentation

#lineup-experimentation

It's been tough to watch Toronto face a wave of injury adversity, with several players missing in action among both starters and reserves. But on the bright side, the Raptors have still managed to play winning basketball and are experimenting with the lineup options available to them in the meantime. When everyone across the Raptors' roster is healthy, Toronto has mostly rolled out the usual starting five of Quickley, Barrett, Ingram, Barnes, and Poeltl.

Facing an overmatched opponent that allowed him to freely tinker with his lineups, Mick Cronin tried plenty of mixing and matching Tuesday afternoon. The UCLA coach apparently liked what he found in reserves Trent Perry, Jamar Brown and Brandon Williams. Perry was a playmaking force with his scoring and smart passes. Brown did a little bit of everything in an energetic fashion. Williams showed plenty of toughness as the second big man in small lineups also featuring Tyler Bilodeau.

"We're just trying to find the combination in our middle six," he said. "With Dubois out now, it's just been a challenge, whether it's (Connor McMichael) in the middle, and Sourdif, (Hendrix Lapierre). So we're trying to figure out what that's going to look like moving forward, whether Mikey can handle the Dubois sort of role, and what our third line looks like: is it Lappy? Is it Sourdif? How do we get Sourdif more involved and more impactful in a game? So those are things that we talk about and look at and dissect and make decisions."