The Toronto Raptors took the season series against the Philadelphia 76ers 3-1, with two of those wins coming post-trade deadline with James Harden on the Sixers roster. They did that despite Fred VanVleet and OG Anunoby missing three of the four games. And guess what? None of that really matters.
The NBA playoffs are a different beast with more preparation and game planning, shorter rotations, different schemes, and most importantly, more physicality. As I wrote about last week, defenders are given significantly more freedom to bump and grind with offensive players in the playoffs, both on the perimeter and in the post, making blow-bys less common and leading defences to collapse less often.