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Raptors' Scottie Barnes Compares Himself to Warriors Legend After Suns-Raptors

Originally posted on Athlon Sports | By Svyato Rovenchuk | Last updated Feb 24, 2025 9:16 AM ET

Scottie Barnes led the Toronto Raptors to a dominant 127-109 victory over the Phoenix Suns on Sunday night. A big reason for the Raptors securing a hard-fought win in the comforts of Scotiabank Arena was undoubtedly the tremendous defensive effort from Barnes. It even gave the Raptors star a boatload of confidence in the statements he made after the game was over.

The key standout from the strong defensive performance was the effort made on Kevin Durant. The Suns superstar struggled with his scoring in this one, posting only 15 points, while shooting 5-of-15 from the field and going 0-of-5 from 3-point land. It was just the fourth time during the 2024-25 NBA season where Durant was held under 20 points.

With the resurgent Raptors defense leading the way to the victory, the 15-time All-Star had no issues with singing the praises of Barnes. However, it was not just Durant who was willing to make strong statements about the defensive ability of the Raptors star. Barnes was more than capable of loudly asserting himself as a big-time player on that end.

The fourth-year pro even gave a lofty comparison for himself in the postgame comments made to Michael Grange.

"I think I'm just a natural star defender. I'm trying to read everything out there on the floor, I'm making my own little game plan, similar to what Draymond [Green] does, just seeing things and adjusting on the fly and the coaches are doing a great job of allowing me to do that, because they know how smart I am on defence.

I’ve been watching KD since I was a kid. You see the things he does, so you have to prepare for him. He’s a tough match-up.”

-Scottie Barnes

For all the critiques that Green receives from the NBA community, there is no denying that the Warriors star is an all-time great defender. The former Defensive Player of the Year is certainly a great candidate for Barnes to try and emulate on the defensive side of the basketball court.

This article first appeared on Athlon Sports and was syndicated with permission.

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