OAKLAND, Calif. -- It all started, oddly enough, with a laugh.

During Kawhi Leonard's introduction to his new fan base in Toronto back in September, he uncorked the most awkward, unexpected chuckle in NBA history, and he was punished for it. The normally robotic Kawhi showed himself to be human, and the result was endless ridicule, memes and parodies -- satiation for the feeding frenzy of NBA Twitter.

Kawhi seemingly hasn't laughed since, at least publicly, and his Raptors teammates have mirrored that stoic, measured demeanor all the way to within a single win of the franchise's first NBA title.

Kawhi's influence was evident as the Raptors left the court following a series-changing 105-92 win over the Warriors in Game 4 at Oracle Arena -- a game which Leonard thoroughly dominated with 36 points, 12 rebounds, four steals and zero turnovers. While the crowd was stunned, perhaps not coming to grips with the fact that they could have just witnessed the last ever NBA game played in Oakland, the Toronto players reacted as if they'd just beaten the Phoenix Suns by 13 on a random Tuesday in February.

"His demeanor has kind of taken a big part of our team," Raptors guard Kyle Lowry said of Leonard following the Game 4 win. "And we have some guys that are fiery and feisty, but we all kind of just stay level-headed and never get too up, never get too down. ... This team has just been a bunch of true professionals, guys that just been continuing to work and work hard. And even our guys that aren't playing, they come in there, they get shots up, they play 3-on-3, they continue to be ready. That's a testament to our team. And with the demeanor that we have, Kawhi definitely brought a lot to that, him and Danny [Green], they kind of definitely brought a lot to that."

The perfect foil to the infamous Kawhi laugh was the latest viral video to make the rounds prior to Game 3 of the NBA Finals, during which the Raptors dispatched the Klay Thompson-less, Kevon Looney-less Golden State Warriors. Raptors backup Norman Powell appeared to request a fist bump from Leonard before the team took the court, only to be denied in the most Kawhi way possible.

"I told him right after that, I was like 'I didn't even know you was trying to dap me. I thought you was trying to get in the team circle,' so I was like, 'let's go over there,'" Leonard explained to ESPN's Rachel Nichols. "But he was like, 'It's all good.' But I ended up giving him like five daps after that."

Leonard was so focused on winning the game (a game that they easily could have taken lightly given the Warriors' injury concerns) that he didn't even realize one of his teammates was holding his fist in front of him for a good five seconds. Then, when he realized it, he calmly pointed to the much more appropriate place to exchange pleasantries, as if Powell had just asked him to take a selfie in the middle of an opera -- "Not here, Norm."

It's not as if Leonard came in and imposed his level-headed will on the team -- there are plenty of personalities that fit the imperturbable Kawhi mold, including head coach Nick Nurse, whose exchanges with the media could easily be packaged and sold as guided meditations due to his laid-back nature.

But surely at some point, particularly given the intensity of playoff basketball, there has to be a need for someone more vocal -- someone who isn't afraid to call players out, to keep people motivated when the chips are down and the team's fate hangs in the balance. Even the Warriors, for years led by zen masters Stephen Curry and Klay Thompson, need the volcanic nature of Draymond Green to keep the forces balanced properly.

So who does that for the Raptors? Everyone, according to Marc Gasol, who came over from the Memphis Grizzlies in February.

"I think we do it collectively," Gasol said. "You look at the series and you look at the games and at some point everyone -- it's like having a car. What's the most important piece of a car? The whole car. The smaller things break and your car doesn't run. So you need everybody to be ready because you never know when you're going to need someone."

So it's not necessarily that the Raptors never show emotion, it's that they possess experienced and composed players who know when to show emotion, and how much. It's a matter of perspective, and it's why they've refused to talk about anything but the next game at every step of the playoffs.

"Like, somebody gets a big play, OK, you may scream or yell. You go back down the other end of the court and you've got to play defense," Raptors guard Fred VanVleet said. "Nobody's getting satisfied with small victories. We don't care about that stuff. We want to win the NBA championship -- that's what our goal is, and we've just got to stay locked into that and have the laser-like focus to go out there and achieve that. Until then, none of the other stuff matters."

With the Raptors just one win away from the title, it's hard to even imagine what the on-court celebration will look like. We got a glimpse of it when Kawhi hit his epic Game 7 winner to send home the Philadelphia 76ers in the second round -- a shot that will be on every NBA playoff highlight reel in perpetuity -- but since then it's been all business. You can guarantee that the Toronto fans will lose their minds, but just don't expect the same from Leonard, who was still having trouble even envisioning a celebration after the Game 4 win.

"I'm really not sure. I guess you really would have to ask somebody on the street or one of our fans," Leonard said of the potential championship celebration from the Toronto faithful. "I'm pretty sure it's a long time waiting. They're going to be excited. I mean, they're already excited just at us just being here for the first time. They're going crazy after the Eastern Conference finals and -- I don't know, there's no telling. You got to ask probably, like I said, a fan or somebody that's in Canada, been living in Canada for a while. But I know they're going to be super excited. I don't know. We'll see."