When the Toronto Raptors won a franchise-best 49 games last season, but were still swept by the Washington Wizards in the first round, some questions arose about Dwane Casey’s coaching abilities. Casey stayed on as head coach, and the Raps have yet again smashed their franchise win record, this time with 55 wins, with a very easy shot at 56(vs. the Nets). This means close to nothing if the team doesn’t find some semblance of playoff success, but Raptors GM Masai Ujiri isn’t waiting to see how his team fares in the postseason before endorsing Casey. Ujiri on Casey, via Josh Lewenberg of TSN Sports:
“He’s been phenomenal, I think. Whether it’s reading games, or adjustments and just growth overall as a coach. To be honest, everybody makes such a big deal about, like okay if we don’t go past the first round what’s going to happen?
Coach Casey deserves to be the coach, that’s 100% and I stand by that. He deserves to be our coach in the future because he’s put in the work to bring winning to our program.
Players have responded well and it’s translated a little bit. We hope that it translates to the playoffs and I’m very hopeful that it will because he’s a defensive-minded coach. I think he’s been tremendous for us.”
Ujiri isn’t the only one who wants Casey to keep his job. Raptors All-Star point guard Kyle Lowry has said publicly(I believe it was in Zach Lowe’s podcast) that he will be vocal in his support of Casey sticking around.
