By taking a step back, Kyle Lowry helped the Raptors take many steps forward

Lowry’s years-long journey from prickly malcontent to selfless leader is now complete.

The game was ambling toward its final act: a dreaded crunch-time duel with the Wizards, each possession burdened by the Raptors’ mystifying Game 1 losing streak and memories of collapsing to Washington in 2015.

But Kyle Lowry, sprinting down the floor, was determined to end matters then and there. With two minutes remaining and Washington trailing by eight, Delon Wright fumbled the ball to John Wall, a 6’4 athletic specimen that’s still one of the NBA’s fastest players despite being hobbled.

Everything rode on which player got to the hoop first. Lowry, four inches shorter and more than a step slower, had a running start. He led the regular season in charges drawn, but with mere seconds to decelerate, turn and position himself, he was too late to try that tactic.

Wall lifted off, forcing the ground-bound Lowry to leave his feet. Despite vaulting upwards at a perpendicular angle, Lowry contorted mid-air with his arms straight up, disrupting Wall’s flight path. Wall double-clutched, bricking the lay-up.

It was an exceptionally athletic feat for a guy not known for being athletic. After the game, both Wall and referee Joe Borgia, the senior vice president of replay and referee operations, credited Lowry for staying vertical and not fouling Wall.

In the 2014-15 playoffs, when the Wizards swept the Raptors, Lowry couldn’t do that. Plagued by nagging injuries, he looked inwards and shed 15 pounds over the offseason so he would have more in the tank by Game 83. He still spent a decent chunk of the next postseason hobbled and muzzled, but to his credit, Lowry had a career year and led Toronto the Eastern Conference Finals, all because he embarked on a digestive “culture reset” long before team president Masai Ujiri’s mandate this offseason.

When Lowry got to Toronto, he was prickly, stubborn, considered uncoachable, and, most importantly, just passing through. He was even on the verge of being traded to New York before the Knicks pulled out of the deal at the last minute. Then, the winning started and Lowry became Toronto’s emotional leader, a fiery and all-knowing floor general who always delivered what the moment required, be it a charge, steal or transition three. He was an accidental leader that turned into a great one with constant repetition.

Lowry didn’t have to worry about modernizing his game this season like the rest of his teammates, who added some combination of playmaking, shooting, defense, and slashing. He represented the side of the Raptors’ problems that couldn’t be fixed on a practice court, problems he’s been picking at for years: fatigue and mental fortitude.

His task, then? Fewer minutes, fewer shots, and less time with the ball, a difficult ask of a player who made a career of stretching his body to its upper limit.

“He doesn’t want to come out, which is good,” head coach Dwane Casey said. “You admire that. But staying at a certain minute count is beneficial to him. He has been great all year at handling it. You are seeing [the benefits] now with his intensity.”

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By taking one step back in the regular season, Lowry has — at least early on — taken two steps forward.

Casey laughed when asked if playing less minutes was an easy sell. Referencing Lowry’s competitive fire and stubbornness, he asked rhetorically, “do you know Kyle very well?”

He likely knew the answer. Lowry is quiet, media-reticent, and has little desire for the spotlight, attitudes that serve a season-long mandate to self-sacrifice.

Because of their win-by-committee style and unprecedented success, nearly every Raptors player had their moment in the national spotlight. The star of the post-game scrum was different almost every night this season. Backup point guard Fred VanVleet essentially took over the locker room spokesman role, allowing Lowry to work in relative obscurity.

“They both work hard, so we gravitate towards that naturally, the energy they put out” Norm Powell explained, mapping out a compare-and-contrast chart. “Kyle’s really intense, and Freddy’s only intense when he needs to be. That’s the only difference.”

It’s the little things, like not yelling at his big men and taking a tough whistle on the chin. According to Sportsnet’s Michael Grange, Lowry has even tried picking up some cues from VanVleet.

“He can be kind of an ass at times,” VanVleet said affectionally. “But he’s one of the best teammates you could ever find.”

Late in the second quarter of Game 1, the Raptors faced a series of calls that didn’t go their way. The ball ricocheted off Ibaka’s knee after Wall lost control in the lane. Lowry fell flat on his back trying to draw a charge on Bradley Beal. Jonas Valanciunas dove and saved the ball into Beal’s hands, which gave the Wizards a new shot clock. Wall, who got the ball because Lowry stayed in the play and smothered Beal, missed a mid-range jumper over rookie O.G. Anunoby, only to get the bail-out whistle.

At that dead ball, Lowry began complaining. Fans started chanting “Refs you suck.” Two possessions later, with Wall on the line, it’s “Bull-shit! Bull-shit!” By half, the Wizards led by four.

The Raptors could have crumbled in frustration. In fact, they did just a month ago against the Thunder, a close loss in which Lowry fouled out, sat alone on the edge of the bench, and watched Casey, Ibaka, and DeMar DeRozan also got ejected. They did not this time.

In the second half, Lowry, guarded Beal and turned the tables. He hounded Beal, fighting around dribble handoffs, bumping Beal’s backdowns to 20 feet. When Lowry locks down defensively, he becomes his man, mirroring every twitch. He is rugged and well-balanced, hard to fake out, a habitual remnant of his stockier days. At one point, Beal pushed Lowry out of his airspace before running off a baseline screen, out of frustration or an attempt to create space, and got called for a foul. Prior to Game 2, he and Wall both complained about the officiating.

Wall, for his part, has raised his arms up in frustration nearly every time he’s ventured into the paint and missed, giving the Raptors’ transition offense a head start and a psychological edge. In the playoffs, that historically been a Lowry-esque move. This year, the shoe is on the other foot.

“We all mature,” Casey said. “I matured. Kyle has been a great leader in a different way. He is more composed and calm.”

If one is to believe that a team takes on the temperament of its leader, that’s a huge step for Lowry and the Raptors. The question, as ever, is whether they can keep it up. But so far, so good.