If timing is everything, Kyle Lowry is very good at everything. In his seventh NBA season, the point guard for the Toronto Raptors with a reputation for his toughness on the court finally received a chance to show what he could do in the international spotlight.
Leading a team that had very low expectations from NBA fans, Lowry had his best season as a pro, averaging 17.9 points, 7.4 assists and 4.7 rebounds per game. The Raptors finished the season with a 48-34 record and awoke a fan base in Toronto that was eager to support the style of basketball the Raptors were playing.
“Last season put people on notice,” Lowry says. “I was able to show the league, and the world, what I can do. Me and DeMar DeRozan, we put it on our shoulders. We wanted to show that we’re professionals and we’re out here to do a job. We’re here to win.”
That fire is part of what made Lowry one of the most sought after unrestricted free agents this summer in the NBA. In fact, Lowry’s name surface several times throughout the past season in trade talks, with teams looking for the one more player they need. “Rumors are rumors until the papers are signed,” Lowry says.
And despite rumors of teams like Miami and Houston pursuing Lowry to be a piece in their championship aspiration puzzle, Lowry stayed true to the Raptors, resigning with the team for four years and $48 million.
“If you watched the playoff games last year, you saw what kind of basketball town Toronto can be,” Lowry says. “You saw 10,000 people outside watching a basketball game. It’s a testament to how hard the team worked.”
Signing the deal was also an exclamation point on Lowry’s NBA dream. It doesn’t seem long ago that he was a sophomore at Villanova. “After we lost our last game at Villanova,” Lowry says, “a reporter asked if I was going to play in the NBA next. I hadn’t really allowed myself to think about it until that moment. I hadn’t even picked a major in college yet. After I sat down and discussed it with my coach and my family, I decided to pursue that dream. Here I am eight years later, signing a long-term deal. The league average is a lot shorter than that. To have a contract that takes me past 10-plus years, not everyone gets to do that.”
At just age 28, with eight seasons on his resume, Lowry will now face a crop of rookies coming into the league that saw him play as a pro when they were 11 and 12 years old. “I still look at myself as a very young guy,” he says. “I still have a whole lot to learn and a whole lot of growing to do both in basketball and off the court. But I look forward to being teammates with those young guys and playing against them, the same way that I had a chance to play against guys like Tim Duncan and Tony Parker. I would love to be able to help a young guy get to the position where I am in now.” At 12-2, with the league's best record, there are a lot of players who would like to be where Kyle Lowry is.
