On Monday night, the Toronto Raptors, as the hosts, will seek retribution for their earlier loss to the Charlotte Hornets earlier this month.

Aaron Rodgers’s return only appealed to the Jets’ supporters; as for Toronto’s Scottie Barnes, he managed to achieve a triple-double at Charlotte with 31 points, 10 rebounds, and 10 assists. However, despite his efforts, the Hornets triumphed 119-116 with Gordon Hayward scoring 24 points. Nevertheless, the Hornets have suffered four consecutive defeats after being convincingly defeated 135-82 at their home by the Philadelphia 76ers on Saturday.

Following their 125-104 home defeat to the Atlanta Hawks on Friday, the Raptors have lost five out of six games. The Raptors split a pair of games against the Hawks at the beginning of a four-game homestand. The 53-point defeat suffered by Charlotte on Saturday night marked the worst in the franchise’s history.

The Hornets were missing several players in the game against the 76ers. Hayward did not play due to an illness, and Terry Rozier left the game during the third quarter after being hit on the nose and did not return. After the game, Hornets coach Steve Clifford said, “One thing about the NBA, you tell them the truth. Look, we’ve got to get our guys back.” He added, “It’s a brutal stretch. This stretch here – this week, the next two weeks – there’s no easy weeks in this league, but if you look at the upcoming schedule, it’s going to be hard, and we’re not sure when those guys will come back.”

At the time of the game against Philadelphia, the Hornets were also without LaMelo Ball (ankle), Mark Williams (back), P.J. Washington, and Cody Martin (knee). Clifford mentioned, “The overall story of the game would be more about the guys that didn’t play than did, I would say. But there’s always things you can learn from a game.”

Regarding the need to avoid falling too far behind until the injured players return, Clifford said, “We’ve got to find a way to win enough so that when we get everybody at full strength and then a little time to get a game kind of together, that we’re not too far out… So much of your record, and this is every year, depends on how good the East is. And right now, this year, the East is brutal. If you can get close to .500, I bet you that’ll be good enough to get in.”

In the loss to the Hawks, the Raptors were outscored by 18 points from the 3-point range and missed 11 out of 25 free-throw attempts. Moreover, the Hawks had a 16-3 advantage in offensive rebounds. Despite shooting 51.9 percent from the field, the Raptors struggled from beyond the arc, making only 10 out of 31 attempts. Barnes led the Raptors with 23 points, four rebounds, and eight assists, but his performance from the free-throw line was subpar at 4-for-8. Pascal Siakam, who scored 33 points against the Hawks on Wednesday, managed to score only 15 points on Friday.

Raptors coach Darko Rajakovic pointed out, “You know what? They got 16 offensive rebounds for 24 second-chance points. It’s hard to have any pace when they have so many opportunities there.” He highlighted the need to improve defensive stops and rebounds. He noted, “We got to the free-throw line quite a bit, 25 times to the free-throw line. We missed 11 free throws tonight. So it’s hard to play that way, to create that pace on the offensive end… we did not do a good enough job with that.”