Utah Jazz: 3 Match-ups to watch versus defending champions Toronto Raptors

Royce O’Neale vs Pascal Siakam

The most dynamic player on the Toronto Raptors is third year pro Pascal Siakam. He was the NBA’s Most Improved Player of 2018-19, developing into a competent second fiddle to Kawhi Leonard en route to an NBA championship.

This year, the growth hasn’t slowed down at all for the former New Mexico State Aggie. Pascal wasn’t meant to be a role player in the NBA, he was a star just in late blooming. He wasn’t drafted very high (27th overall) and didn’t make any All-Rookie teams his first year.

He goes for 23.6 points and 7.5 rebounds per night, and can create his own shot through isolation or get right to the basket with his good handles and length.

As for how the Jazz will combat that tonight, they will use their own late blooming NBA product Royce O’Neale. Royce went undrafted and had to carve out a career overseas.

He caught the eye of Dennis Lindsey and earned a training camp invite in the fall of 2017. He stuck like Velcro to the Jazz, blooming as a 3-and-D ace that can guard power forwards in today’s smaller NBA.

Since being re-inserted back into the starting lineup, O’Neale is proving that the Jazz got a bargain when they locked him up for four years and 36 million dollars. His low maintenance offense allows the four other Jazz starters to get the space and touches they need to operate.

Siakam is a very good defender himself, and Royce will need to be on the ball with his 3-point shot tonight to give the Raptors’ top-notch defense a run for their money. I’m guessing the Raps will assign Siakam to guard Bojan Bogdanovic, but Royce hitting his three point shots will only help.

As for my prediction of the final score, this ought to be a close game that will be gutted out as both teams are very tired right now. I’ll pick the Raptors to win, 114 to 110.