The Toronto Raptors will host the Philadelphia 76ers on Saturday afternoon. Then, a two-day break ensues before they head to Dallas to take on the Mavericks.
Once again, the Raptors won't play on Christmas Day — a marquee day for the NBA.
“It has gotten to the point where you just sigh and say, ‘Another year,’” DeMar DeRozan told Marc J. Spears of The Undefeated. “That’s crazy. I always wanted to say that I’m playing on Christmas.”
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It’s not just recently they’ve been snubbed — the Raptors haven’t played on Christmas Day since 2001.
Now though, the Raptors currently hold the No. 2 spot in the Eastern Conference and have been a solid contender in the East for years.
That, DeRozan said, is what makes it so frustrating.
“We’ve won,” DeRozan said. “We’ve been one of the best in the league the past few years. To not get that look is definitely crazy. … There is really no excuse. We’ve proven we are a top team in the league for a reason.”
NBA senior vice president Tom Carelli told The Undefeated in an email that choosing the 10 teams who play on Christmas Day is one of the more difficult decisions they make when creating the schedules.
Carelli said they consider all 30 teams in the league, and are attempting to provide fans with “compelling matchups based on storylines, rivalries, competitiveness of the teams, star players and the history of the teams and players competing on Christmas Day.”
The NBA certainly did that in some matchups. The Golden State Warriors host the Cleveland Cavaliers in a 2017 NBA Finals rematch. The Houston Rockets take on the Oklahoma City Thunder in a battle of two Western Conference powerhouses.
Yet some matchups — like the Philadelphia 76ers and the New York Knicks, or the Minnesota Timberwolves and the Los Angeles Lakers — are just average.
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Kyle Lowry said he was initially frustrated, simply because he hasn’t had the chance to play on one of the NBA’s biggest days. In fact, it was one of the first things he looked at on the schedule when it was first released.
This way, though, he gets to spend time with his family — which Lowry said is more important.
“I have never played on Christmas,” Lowry said. “I’ve always in my life wanted to play a Christmas game. There are a lot of things I want to say as the reason I think ‘why not’ [for Toronto]. It’s never happened, but I’ve always had the opportunity to always be with my family on Christmas. It’s a blessing to be able to not play, but at the same you always want that one time you play on Christmas.”
Maybe next year the Raptors will get to play on Dec. 25. Until then, it’s still a dream for DeRozan and Lowry.
“You get the special shoes. The Christmas jerseys,” Lowry said. “That’s one I want to frame one day. Hopefully, I get the opportunity to do it.”