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TSN Raptors Reporter

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TORONTO - With the Raptors officially locked into a top-two seed in the East for the first time in team history, the focus now shifts to who they'll face when the playoffs open the weekend after next, at least for those of us outside the locker room.

They're in a unique position as they close out the regular season's final five games, sitting pretty atop a conference that has been nip and tuck all year long. They can't fall below second place and, while first is still in play, it's become something of a long shot as the Cavaliers need any combination of two wins or Toronto losses to clinch the top spot.

Their first-round opponent will almost certainly be the seventh seed, but who that turns out to be is anyone's guess. More and more, the likely candidates appear to be the Indiana Pacers and Detroit Pistons, though the dreaded Chicago Bulls are still hanging around as an outside possibility.

After Tuesday night's action, Indiana is holding onto a half game cushion in seventh over Detroit, who has played one more contest, while Chicago sits two full games out of the eighth and final playoff seed.

So, with everything on the line in what will be a crucial and possibly franchise-altering series for the Raptors, who should they be hoping to see? 

Although they'd be a strong and likely consensus favourite against either, the Pacers and Pistons present different challenges and neither is a slam dunk. Toronto holds a 2-1 season-series advantage versus both teams, with Indiana in town for one final meeting on Friday.

Nothing about those Pacers games have been pretty, as you might expect, and even with their new, smaller look this season, each match-up has turned into a dogfight. Indiana shot below 39 per cent in two of the three meetings, while Toronto was held under 37 per cent in a couple. The Raptors' wins came on opening night and in overtime later in the campaign, a game in which Bismack Biyombo grabbed 25 boards. The loss, one of their strangest of the year, saw them cough up an early 21-point lead in an embarrassing 39-4 first-half Pacers run.

The positives: they've dominated on the boards (outrebounding Indy 188-155), Kyle Lowry and DeMar DeRozan have fared relatively well, each scoring over 20 points in all three meeting and - most importantly - Paul George has barely been a factor.

The Raptors have held George to an average of 17.0 points, scoring 18 or fewer in each game, on 30 per cent shooting, including 24 per cent from three-point range with DeMarre Carroll checking him in one of the victories and DeRozan doing an admirable job in the other.

Outside of George and, to a lesser extent, Monta Ellis (11.7 points on 35 per cent shooting versus Toronto this year), the Pacers lack players capable of creating their own shot. Still, they remain one of their better and more physical defensive teams in the league (third in defensive efficiency), which would certainly test a Raptors team that has struggled against those types of opponents in the past.

All three meetings with Detroit came in the span of a month, all in the second half of the season. Both wins were decisive and the lone defeat came with Lowry on the bench getting a night of rest. 

One of the youngest teams in the league, the Pistons lack playoff experience, which - as the Raptors know - can make them an ideal first-round match-up. That said, they're a deep, well-coached team with a lot of guys that can beat you. They feature one of the game's best big men in Andre Drummond and, like he did with Dwight Howard in Orlando, Stan Van Gundy has done a nice job surrounding him with shooters.

Detroit shot 49 per cent against the Raptors this season, getting double-figure scoring from at least six players in all three games.

Obviously, it should go without saying, the Bulls are a team they - and just about everyone else - would like to avoid because of Chicago's experience and toughness.

Dwane Casey's club will have one last opportunity to put their stamp on the race for seventh place when they host Indiana later in the week. How they approach that game on the second night of a back-to-back will be an interesting subplot late in the season. With five games remaining, their last three against Eastern Conference bottom feeders, a win over Toronto would really boost the Pacers' chances of landing the seventh seed, and resting Lowry or others could help facilitate that.

If they have a preferred first-round opponent, they're keeping it to themselves.

"Whoever it is, we've just got to be prepared for it," DeRozan said after his team's 96-90 win over Charlotte on Tuesday. "We can't hope for somebody. Whoever it's going to be, that's who it's going to be and we've got to be ready for it."

That's one of many lessons they should have learned from last season's fallout. Like some fans and members of the media, several Raptors players had privately expressed a desire to play Washington in the first round, in part because they swept the season-series with the Wizards, but also because it would set up a second-round match-up against Atlanta, instead of Cleveland.

With their own seeding still up in the air at this time last year - playing for third place or fourth, where they ended up finishing - they had more control over who they faced. Placing third would've matched them up with the Milwaukee Bucks, who would fall to Chicago in six games. Perhaps they may have fared better against the young Bucks, perhaps not, but the moral of the story is twofold: 1) be careful what you wish for, and 2) more often than not, you can go ahead and throw the season series out the window.

"I said the same thing I'm saying now and I learned a long time ago, you take what the standings give you and you better be ready for them," Casey reiterated ahead of Tuesday's game. "I think the basketball gods will get you every time if you start trying to mess with the game. You've got to take what the standings give you. You've got to look at it, but you can't sit here and say, 'I want to play them, I'd much rather play them, we match-up better.' No, because you'll get what you asked for. You've got to prepare for them, but then again, you've got to take what the standings give you."

Match-up aside, there's a conceivable scenario in which they could lose to just about anyone, same as they could beat just about anyone, depending on which version of the Raptors show up, and that should have been the biggest takeaway from last spring's post-season disaster.

They'll tell you that remains their primary focus over these last few games, ensuring they're at their best and at their healthiest for Game 1, as it should be. In that regard, their tough late-season schedule has actually been beneficial. Casey, his coaching staff and their players deserve credit for picking their spots in maximizing opportunities for rest, while also testing themselves against some of the league's most physical opponents.

"It gives us a sense of physicality of how the game's going to be played [in the post-season] and so far, I like the way we've responded," Casey said. "What you don't want is two weeks of guys totally being out, being off and now you have to ramp it up to 100 per cent once the playoffs start. Because I just don't think you can turn it off completely and turn it on completely, it's just hard to do."