Heading into his fourth season with the Toronto Raptors, Scottie Barnes has big expectations on his shoulders.
The clear face of the franchise after an up-and-down season that saw the organization trade away key pieces like OG Anunoby and Pascal Siakam, the 23-year-old Florida native appears ready to take another step forward this season.
And in an off-season training video posted to Instagram by the ballislife account and shot by jxnfilmedit, Barnes made some proclamations about the upcoming season.
“They say we need to rebuild, but I just want to win right now. I’m a winner, that’s been my mindset since day one. I don’t like losing, and I’m just trying to get back to winning basketball,” Barnes said in the video.
Barnes averaged 19.9 points, 8.2 rebounds and 6.1 assists in 60 games last season for the Raptors and made the All-Star team for the first time in his career.
Although he became the de facto leader of the team once Barnes himself suffered a hand injury in early March that sidelined him for the remainder of the season.
The fourth overall pick in the 2021 NBA Draft, Barnes is the only player in his draft to have appeared in an All-Star Game so far.
But it will take more than Barnes’ individual success for Toronto to compete in what is expected to be a tight Eastern Conference this season. The franchise is coming off one of its worst years in recent memory, finishing 12th in the conference with a record of just 25-57.
With the NBA preseason starting in early October (and the Raptors kicking off theirs with a game in Montreal), it’ll be a little over a month before the games really matter. Toronto will open its 2024-25 regular season on Oct. 23, when it hosts the Cleveland Cavaliers at Scotiabank Arena.