Pascal Siakam on Raptors in Tampa: 'Nothing Has Been Normal for a Long Time'

The Toronto Raptors will start the 2020-21 season playing their home games in Tampa, Florida, because of travel restrictions amid the COVID-19 pandemic, and Pascal Siakam summed up the strange circumstances his team is facing.

"Nothing has been normal for a long time," he said, per Marc J. Spears of ESPN's The Undefeated. "We are still learning. We are still adjusting."

Siakam did say he is looking forward to living somewhere warm.

The Raptors are not the first professional sports team that needed to adjust to Canada's coronavirus limitations. The Toronto Blue Jays played their home games in Buffalo, New York, during the shortened 2020 Major League Baseball season, which did not prevent them from reaching the playoffs.

Still, it is an understatement to say nothing has been normal for some time in the face of the pandemic, and the Raptors and Blue Jays' temporary homes are just two of countless examples of the upheaval the virus has caused.

At least the Raptors are accustomed to playing in the state, considering the NBA finished its 2019-20 season at the Walt Disney World Resort in the Orlando area.

Toronto was one of the 22 teams invited for the seeding games that led into the playoffs and eventually earned the No. 2 seed in the Eastern Conference. It was an impressive showing, considering Kawhi Leonard was no longer on the roster, although the team lost to the Boston Celtics in seven games in the second round.

Siakam was a primary reason the Raptors were still contenders, as he was an All-Star and All-NBA selection who averaged 22.9 points, 7.3 rebounds and 3.5 assists per game during the regular season.

Whether he can replicate that performance will go a long way toward determining if the Raptors are again near the top of the East.