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After a crushing of their rivals (in divisional occupancy only) Friday night, the Raps welcome the suddenly mighty Boston Celtics to the ACC for a Sunday afternoon showdown. It’s also the first time that a little outfit called Texas the CBC is airing the game. It’s official: The Raps are a pretty big deal.

If the pretty big deal bit isn’t felt simply by seeing that little CBC logo in the bottom right hand side of the screen, George Strombolopolous is here to hammer it home for you. He opens with a Bob Costas-esque pre-game stage setter (The Raps were once great, then fell off real hard, but now are back, thanks to Bryan Colangello). At one point in the intro, half of Strombo’s face is on screen. Edgy.

Inside the ACC, Elliotte Friedman stands under the Raptors basket as the layup line takes place behind him. It’s nice not to be annoyed by an on-court personality during a Raps broadcast. I almost get hope that there’s going to be new blood calling the game. Then it goes over to Chuck and Leo. Actually, this is the only thing I’ll say about the announce crew today: they weren’t that bad. The Swirsk dedicated a three-ball to some guy in downtown Lethbridge, AB, but beyond that, I didn’t catch any of Swirsky’s regular over the top schilling and ridiculous attempts to get a voice clip onto Court Cuts. Maybe the CBC has him on a leash? If so, they should pull tighter. It’s nice not having to cringe every time something good happens on the court.

Then again, maybe Swirsky was under control because for 36 minutes of this game, so were the Raptors. I’m getting ahead of myself though. It’s starting lineup time:
Toronto               Boston

Kapono                  Rondo
Bargnani                Allen
A. Parker               Perkins
Ford                       Pierce
Bosh                       KG

The change in musical selection for the starting lineups this year is noted and appreciated. Kanye West > Renegades of funk.

3/4 of a Raptors game in 49 words: For the first 36 minutes of this game, the Raptors stunk. They missed just about everything they put up in the first half, tallying only 31 points. They seemed destined to lose, as Boston’s big three did everything right to counter every shortcoming the Raps were creating for themselves.

Then the fourth quarter came and things got interesting.

Jason Kapono looked good down the stretch, hitting the long-range shots that he was brought in to hit. Leo Rautins called him a more consistent version of Morris Peterson, which would probably make Mo cry, but is accurate.

A big knock on the Celts has been the thinness of their roster in spots 4 through 12. James Posey showed up to play today though. In the fourth quarter alone, he hit two big treys, took an offensive foul on TJ Ford where he set an illegal screen in the open court that promptly put Ford on his ass that would have brought a smile to the faces of Jordin Tootoo and Derek Boogaard. He then redeemed himself on the next possession by drawing an offensive foul on Chris Bosh.

KG dominated Chris Bosh in OT. Bosh shouldn’t feel too bad, though. KG’s gonna be doing that to people all year. Watching this matchup alone is worth the price of admission to me. Bosh was able to strike back on the offensive end, but man, KG looked really good in OT today.

This was my first look at the Celtics and they were impressive. KG can dominate on the block like he did in OT today and he’s capable of grabbing you 15-20 boards on any night while he’s at it; Ray Allen bombs away from the outside like he did today—okay seriously, how does Allen get that open on that play at the end of overtime? The guy only had 30 points in the game and was shooting 9-14 up to that point. Why wouldn’t you put a guy on him and blanket him everywhere he goes? I’d rather lose on an open under the basket layup by Rondo or someone than have Ray Allen drop that bomb on you to seal the deal. Even for someone who prides himself on being an impartial NBA fan (unless the Jazz are playing, who get no mercy from my whatsoever), that was heart-breaking.

TJ Ford looked tentative on the first two possessions in OT today, but then just took off. The Ford-Calderon ying-yang relationship is an interesting one. You’d never see Calderon go to work like that on the opposition. Down the stretch, as soon as Ford got the ball in his hands he was either gone to the hoop or putting up a trey. And no one could touch him.

A girl behind the Celts’ bench looked like Paris Hilton.

Even though they lost, I think this was a great game for the Raps. They played like a bag of ass for three quarters and easily could have rolled over and died in the fourth, but they fought their way through and found their game. If they had found it a little sooner, there might have been a different outcome.