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LOS ANGELES — Raptors’ head coach Nick Nurse was as happy as anyone with Sunday’s upset over the heavily favoured Lakers.

How could he not be?

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But down a little deeper there had to be an even greater sense of accomplishment after this one.

The seeds for this particular win were sown back in the latter stages of the pre-season when Nurse put his tough love cap on and refused to settle when he knew there was more to get from some of his personnel.

It was an early week practice and the Raptors were six days away from opening the season. A run-of-the-mill question about how nice it had to feel that the newcomers to his team all came with defence-first reputations started it.

Nurse didn’t just disagree with the premise of the question, he went on to slag the defensive efforts of all the newcomers and stated that until they showed him proof of that defence-first mentality and an ability to match the intensity of the seven returnees playing ahead of them he wasn’t prepared to give them minutes.

Then he stuck to his guns and did just that sticking with a seven-man and at times eight-man rotation through most of the first seven games.