Beyond their struggles in Game 3, Siakam and VanVleet have been poor over all three games of the playoff series.
Pascal Siakam, a potential All-NBA candidate, and Fred VanVleet, the Raptors' lone all-star this season, both struggled during Toronto's 104-101 overtime loss to the Philadelphia 76ers in Game 3 of their first-round playoff series.
According to the Raptors, however, the blame can't be put on Siakam and VanVleet as they adapted to what was thrown their way. “So at this point of the year, Pascal is doing his job. He's drawing a crowd. He's going to get all the defensive attention. So he didn't have an excellent shooting night, but I thought he was still aggressive, getting to his spots and kicking out and bringing enough attention.”
As good as Toronto's secondary options were - even setup by the squad's primary scorers - the Raptors' star duo didn't measure up to what Sixers centre Joel Embiid brought to the game. “To be able to defend their best player and make sure that nothing is easy or that he's not really able to score is always a good recipe to win.”
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