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Sometimes it can be a good thing to connect with your inner child.
But when you’re the Toronto Raptors, and you make millions of dollars playing basketball, you’re probably looking for a little something more in life.
Which is why it came as a surprise when head coach Darko Rajakovic decided to celebrate the team’s recent win streak in the most childish fashion imaginable — a pizza party.
“I told them that when we won three straight I’d take them to dinner,” Rajakovic explained after the team’s 130-122 victory over the Indiana Pacers on Monday night. “But I told them this team’s so humble, we could have pizza.”
Now, don’t get me wrong. Pizza is delicious. The Ninja Turtles absolutely had the right idea here. But any player on the Toronto Raptors could go and buy as much pizza as they wanted from any place they could find at any given time.
Instead, they’re celebrating an NBA win streak like a 10-year-old kid who just finished his reading goal for the semester.
Then again, maybe this is just me being salty that I personally never reached that reading goal. Too busy reading SI For Kids to complete any sort of young adult novel.
The Raptors began the year with one of the oldest rosters on average in the NBA. But trades of both Pascal Siakam (to the Pacers) and OG Anunoby (to the Knicks) have signaled a clear rebuild and left the team in the hands of young players such as Scottie Barnes and Grady Dick.
Barnes put up 21 points, 12 rebounds and 12 assists against the Pacers. While Dick, the No. 13 pick in the 2023 NBA Draft, put up 18 points with two clutch 3-pointers late in the game.
“This is just the beginning,” Rajakovic said of Dick. “He’s going to have good games, he’s going to have bad games, but he needs to continue winning in those situations, continue to learn and get better.”
Despite the win, Toronto is just 22-36 on the year and toward the bottom of the NBA‘s Eastern Conference. So it’s hard to imagine there will be too many more pizza parties in the immediate future.