Toronto Raptors

• 1. Introduction

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  Ontario's lottery corporation once held the Toronto Raptors' future in its hands. The NBA had conditionally awarded Canada its 28th franchise on the 4th of November 1993, for a then-record expansion fee of $125 million. But wagering on NBA games was part of Ontario's provincial lottery, and the league's own rules strictly prohibited gambling on its games. A deal was eventually struck. The Ontario Lottery and Gaming Corporation agreed to stop offering NBA wagers entirely. In return, the Raptors committed $5 million over their first three years and $1 million annually afterward to compensate for the lost revenue.

  Toronto's prior relationship with professional basketball was short and distant. The city had hosted the very first game in NBA history on the 1st of November 1946, when the Toronto Huskies played the New York Knickerbockers at Maple Leaf Gardens. Those Huskies folded after one season. Nearly five decades later, the same city was paying a record price to try again. What would the team be called? Who would shape it? And could a franchise based outside the United States ever reach the top of a league it almost never joined? The path from that negotiating table to an NBA championship would take 26 years.

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• 2. The Jurassic Name

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  On the 15th of May 1994, Canadians watching national television learned that their new basketball team would be called the Raptors. The name emerged from a nationwide contest that drew more than 2,000 entries. Ten finalists were considered: Beavers, Bobcats, Dragons, Grizzlies, Hogs, Raptors, Scorpions, T-Rex, Tarantulas, and Terriers. Raptors won out in large part because of Jurassic Park, the 1993 film adapted from Michael Crichton's 1990 science fiction novel. "Raptor" is a common informal name for Velociraptor, the species that had seized the imagination of younger audiences. Team management believed those same young fans would grow up to be loyal to the franchise.

  The previous frontrunner had been the Huskies name, revived from the city's original 1946 team. That option fell away for a practical reason. Designers concluded it would be nearly impossible to create a Huskies logo that did not closely resemble the Minnesota Timberwolves.

  On the 24th of May 1994, first general manager Isiah Thomas appeared at a press conference alongside the team's new logo. The logo depicted a featherless red Velociraptor in white sneakers dribbling a silver basketball. The team's colours were bright red, purple, black, and a shade officially called "Naismith silver," honouring James Naismith, the Canadian inventor of basketball. Before the first game was played, Raptors merchandise had already ranked seventh in league sales. Thomas also received an option to purchase part of the franchise for under market value. He exercised that option twice, acquiring 4.5 per cent in May 1995 and a further 4.5 per cent in December 1995. Each time, the shares came equally from founding partners Bitove and Slaight.

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• 3. The Vince Carter Era

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  During the 1998 NBA draft, general manager Glen Grunwald made the move that would define the franchise's early identity. He traded the team's fourth overall pick, Antawn Jamison, to the Golden State Warriors. Toronto received the fifth selection, Vince Carter, and cash. Carter won the Rookie of the Year Award after the lockout-shortened 1998-99 season. The following year, he emphatically won the 2000 NBA Slam Dunk Contest. The victory drew new fans across Toronto, many of whom had previously shown little interest in basketball.

  The 1999-2000 season was also the first full year the team played at Air Canada Centre. The previous four seasons had been spent at SkyDome, a stadium the franchise described as better suited to baseball and Canadian football. Toronto finished 45-37 and reached the playoffs for the first time in franchise history. Carter had promised fans a playoff berth the previous season, and the city responded.

  The 2000-01 season produced the franchise's best result to that point. Toronto won a franchise-high 47 games and captured its first-ever playoff series, defeating the New York Knicks 3-2. That victory advanced the Raptors to the Eastern Conference semifinals for the first time. Their opponents, the Philadelphia 76ers, relied on Allen Iverson and Dikembe Mutombo. Carter, Alvin Williams, and Antonio Davis led Toronto's offense. The series reached Game 7. With seconds remaining, Carter's potential series-winning shot rolled off the rim. He had attended his graduation ceremony at the University of North Carolina on the morning of that game. Critics pointed to his 6-for-18 shooting that day as evidence the trip had cost him; he had scored 39 points in Game 6.

  Carter anchored the team through one more season but missed much of 2001-02 after suffering patellar tendinitis. At the time of his injury, Toronto held a 29-21 record and had realistic playoff ambitions. Without him, they lost 13 consecutive games. Carter was traded to the New Jersey Nets mid-season in 2004. Toronto received Alonzo Mourning, two forwards, and a pair of mid-to-late first-round draft picks. Mourning refused to report, was bought out for a reported $10 million, and signed with the Miami Heat. The trade was criticized by analysts and eventually cost general manager Rob Babcock his job. Chris Bosh had been taken fourth overall in the 2003 draft. He had been developing quietly through Carter's final seasons and was about to become the franchise's next cornerstone.

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• 4. The Bosh and Colangelo Years

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  Chris Bosh's first full season as the franchise's lead player showed genuine promise. He ranked tenth in the league in defensive rebounds during the 2004-05 season. He soon became the third Raptor, after Carter and Antonio Davis, to earn an All-Star selection. The difficulty was building a roster capable of supporting him.

  On the 27th of February 2006, the organization hired Bryan Colangelo, the 2004-05 NBA Executive of the Year. Colangelo had previously transformed Phoenix into a 62-win team and was regarded as one of the league's top front-office minds. The overhaul he managed in Toronto was swift. The 2006-07 roster was rebuilt around Bosh, first overall draft pick Andrea Bargnani, and newly acquired point guard T.J. Ford. Toronto finished 47-35 and won the Atlantic Division title, securing home-court advantage in the playoffs for the first time in franchise history. Colangelo was named Executive of the Year again. Head coach Sam Mitchell, the first coach in Raptors history to receive the honour, was named Coach of the Year.

  Bosh developed into a consistent All-Star and the team qualified for the playoffs in 2007-08 as well. But the roster could not break past the first round, and a string of overhauls failed to build on the 2006-07 breakthrough. By July 2010, Bosh left in free agency to join the Miami Heat alongside LeBron James and Dwyane Wade. Toronto received two first-round draft picks and a trade exception in the sign-and-trade. The Raptors had drafted DeMar DeRozan with the ninth pick in 2009. Three years later, they acquired point guard Kyle Lowry from the Houston Rockets for a future first-round pick. Together, those two additions would eventually anchor the franchise's most successful sustained stretch.

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• 5. The Masai Ujiri Era

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  Masai Ujiri replaced Colangelo as general manager in 2013, and the change was felt almost immediately. On the 9th of December 2013, Ujiri traded Rudy Gay, Quincy Acy, and Aaron Gray to the Sacramento Kings. The Raptors were 6-12 before that trade and went 10-3 immediately after it. By the 28th of March 2014, they had clinched a playoff berth for the first time since 2008.

  DeMar DeRozan and Kyle Lowry became the face of the franchise through the middle of the decade. Under Ujiri, the Raptors won five division titles and became a consistent playoff team for the first time in franchise history. The 2015-16 season brought the franchise's first-ever 50-win season. The team's 56-26 record was the best in the Eastern Conference outside of Cleveland.

  On the 1st of January 2018, DeRozan scored 52 points in an overtime win over the Milwaukee Bucks, breaking the franchise scoring record. He became the third player in Raptors history to score 50 or more in a single game, joining Carter and Terrence Ross. By the 7th of March 2018, Toronto had clinched a playoff spot in just 64 games, setting a new franchise record for earliest qualification. The Raptors finished that regular season with a franchise-high 59 wins and claimed the Eastern Conference's number one seed for the first time.

  Yet the Cleveland Cavaliers proved an immovable barrier. Toronto was swept in the second round of the 2018 playoffs, becoming the first number one seed swept before the Conference Finals since 1969. Head coach Dwane Casey was fired on the 11th of May 2018, despite winning Coach of the Year that same season. Nick Nurse was promoted as his replacement on June 14. On the 18th of July 2018, DeRozan was sent to the San Antonio Spurs alongside Jakob Poltl and a protected first-round pick. The return was Kawhi Leonard and Danny Green. Leonard was a two-time All-Star and two-time Defensive Player of the Year. His contract covered only one more season, which meant the trade was a high-stakes gamble on a single championship run.

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• 6. The Championship

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  The 2018-19 Raptors got off to the best start in franchise history with a 6-0 opening record. Leonard sat out more than 20 regular season games due to a lingering injury from the previous season. Despite that absence, Toronto finished as the second seed in the Eastern Conference. The playoffs that followed were unlike anything the franchise had experienced.

  In the second round against the Philadelphia 76ers, a seven-game series came down to the final seconds of Game 7. With the game tied, Kawhi Leonard hit a 15-foot shot at the buzzer to give Toronto a 92-90 victory. It was the first game-winning buzzer-beater in a Game 7 in NBA playoff history. The Eastern Conference Finals required a comeback. Toronto lost the first two games in Milwaukee to the top-seeded Bucks. They then won four consecutive games to reach the NBA Finals for the first time in franchise history.

  The Golden State Warriors were waiting, making their fifth consecutive Finals appearance. They included Stephen Curry, whose father Dell Curry had played for the Raptors, and Klay Thompson. Toronto won the series 4-2. Leonard was named Finals MVP. The championship was historic beyond basketball. The Raptors became the first team based outside the United States to win the NBA title. They were also the first such team to win any of the four major North American professional sports league titles. The last time a Canada-based team had won one was when the Toronto Blue Jays claimed the World Series in 1993. That represented a 25-year drought. In the pandemic-shortened season that followed, the Raptors won 53 games despite Leonard's departure. Their 73.6 per cent winning percentage was the best in franchise history.

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• 7. We The North

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  The slogan "We The North" first appeared on the 3rd of August 2015, when the Raptors unveiled four new uniforms. The phrase was stitched as a tag at the waist-level hem of the jersey, visible to players when they tucked it in. The chevrons on the side panels, which had pointed downward since 1999, were reversed to point upward in alignment with the slogan. The shorts gained a maple leaf on the waistband and a reference to Toronto's "T-Dot" nickname on the sides.

  The uniforms were created in partnership with the video game NBA 2K16 and were designed to honour Toronto and Canada. The main colours remained centred on red and white, Canada's national colours. An alternate design was also created in partnership with Toronto-based rapper Drake and his OVO Sound record label.

  The Raptors have been the only Canadian team in the NBA since 2001, when the Vancouver Grizzlies relocated to Memphis, Tennessee. That isolation from any rival Canadian franchise has made the "We The North" identity meaningful beyond branding. In December 2009, the franchise introduced blue-and-white throwback jerseys to commemorate the Toronto Huskies. Those jerseys were based on the ones the Huskies wore in 1946-47, with the exception of the nickname and shorts length. They became annual fixtures at events called "Huskies Nights." For the 2016-17 season, the franchise also revealed a Huskies-themed court to mark the 70th anniversary of the original Toronto Huskies season.

  The team also wears camouflage uniforms based on the temperate variant of CADPAT, the Canadian Disruptive Pattern, during events involving the Canadian Armed Forces. A Chinese New Year jersey features "Toronto" in traditional Chinese characters, with a dragon's head replacing part of the first character. The 2021-22 city edition uniforms brought back the original Velociraptor logo in black and gold, facing the opposite direction from the original. On the 2nd of November 2024, the franchise retired Vince Carter's number 15, the first jersey number the Raptors have retired. His number hangs at Scotiabank Arena alongside the retired number 6 of Bill Russell. The NBA applied Russell's retirement to all teams on the 11th of August 2022.

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