Though the Toronto Raptors’ 2016-17 season isn’t even 10 games old, the team faces a pair of early benchmark games this week in matchups with the defending NBA champions and the runners-up in back-to-back games with the Cleveland Cavaliers and Golden State Warriors.

The Toronto Raptors visit the Cleveland Cavaliers on Tuesday night at 7pm et/4pm pt on TSN 1 and 4.

On Wednesday, the Raptors return home to host the Golden State Warriors at 8pm et/5pm pt across the TSN Network.

Off to a 7-2 start that puts the team near the top of the Eastern Conference behind only the Cavs, the Raptors have weathered a knock to Jonas Valanciunas, an inconsistent DeMarre Carroll, poor shooting and slow starts that might have felled lesser teams. Successive games against the two clubs widely perceived as the Eastern and Western Conference champions in waiting should go a long way in providing a gauge on just where the Raps are an eighth of the way through the campaign.

In looking at the Raptors’ early season success, the obvious catalyst has been the newly crowned Eastern Conference Player of the Week, DeMar DeRozan. DeRozan became the first player in 30 years to score 30-plus in his team’s first five games (the last guy to do that was a former minor-league baseball player by the name of Michael Jordan in 1986).

If he can drop 30 against the Cavs on Tuesday, it will be nine 30-point games in 10 games. The only other player to do that? Actually, there isn’t one. DeRozan would be the first.

Fresh off of his five-year, $139-million deal, DeRozan leads the league in scoring at 34.0 points per game. His early season has been remarkable, but is it sustainable?

Windhorst: DeRozan imposing his will on the NBA

ESPN senior writer Brian Windhorst joins Game Day to discuss DeMar DeRozan's impressive start to the season and a look ahead to the Cavs & Warriors back-to-back this week.

DeRozan – ranked by SI as only the 46th-best player in the NBA in September, something not lost on the 27-year-old – has not changed his game. He still can’t hit from long range. He’s still a volume shooter, so what’s different? Well, DeRozan is a career .445 shooter, but is currently shooting at a .528 clip. While DeRozan has shown no signs of letting up in these early days, it would be folly to bank on the streak to continue. Regression to the mean is a much safer bet. If that were to be the case, the spotlight on secondary scoring will be glaring.

But winning solves everything and as long as the Raptors continue to pile up Ws, questions about whether or not DeRozan’s astonishing run can keep going will fall to the wayside. Winning will also gloss over continued worries over Carroll’s health and the piecemeal approach to time at the four. Seeing the likes of Bebe Nogueira come good with increased playing time will also buoy hopes.

When it comes to the Cavs, this will be a second crack at the champs for the Raptors. The two teams met in the Raptors’ home opener on October 29 when the Cavs grabbed a 94-91 win, led by Kyrie Irving’s 26 points. Tellingly, the Cavs won the battle from the arc, shooting .375 from three to Toronto’s .250.

The three-ball has been the Cavs’ calling card of the early season. The 8-1 Cavs have hit 10 or more threes in their first nine games, something that no team in history has ever done before. In a 100-93 win over the Charlotte Hornets on Sunday, they drained 14 three-pointers, led by six from Channing Frye. With a supporting cast killing opposition from distance, this will only make Irving, LeBron James and Kevin Love even harder to handle.

"If you’re living with me getting 40, LeBron getting 40 and Kev getting 40," Irving said to Dave McMenamin. "If you’re not going to basically play us honest, you’ve got to live with something."

With a battle-tested Cavs having reached the summit a season ago, the emphasis on regular-season success will be downplayed this season by Ty Lue – something also being done by Steve Kerr and the Warriors.

The 2015-16 edition of the Dubs lost their second game of the season on Dec. 30. This year’s Warriors have already been blown out twice to the tune of 29 points by the San Antonio Spurs in their season opener and by 20 points to Luke Walton’s Los Angeles Lakers on Nov. 4. A season after a record-setting 73 victories didn’t result in a second straight NBA title, priorities have changed for the Warriors. Regular- season wins and records are cold comfort when you don’t get that ring in June.

So even with the addition of Kevin Durant and the embracing of a new “Super Villains” nickname, the Warriors are playing the long game this time around.

“This year, we’re going to pace ourselves somewhat,” Kerr told Anthony Slater last month. “But we’re also better off having the new blood and the new life because I think it will give us that boost.”

Though it’s early days, Kerr seems to mean it. Both Durant and Stephen Curry are down this season from their career averages when it comes to playing time (37.7 to 35.0 and 34.8 to 32.6, respectively) and Kerr intends to explore sitting one or the other in back-to-back games if the situation calls for it.

It will be all hands on deck for the Warriors when it comes to the Raptors, though. In their first meeting last November at Oracle Arena, the Raptors got 28 points each from DeRozan and Kyle Lowry, but fell 115-100. Two weeks later at the Air Canada Centre, the Raptors took a late lead, but couldn’t finish off the Warriors, falling 112-109 with Curry dropping 44 and nine three-pointers.

As is their way, win or lose, the Raptors will downplay the significance of these games on Tuesday and Wednesday night. You will hear all manner of “It’s still early” or “We’re not where we want to be,” but rest assured, Dwane Casey’s team knows very well who their opposition is on these two nights and that these are statement games.

The Raptors can go a long way in signaling their intent for 2016-17 over the next two nights.