Not a shred of hesitation.

The ball went in, part of the top overall draft pick's eight points and four rebounds in 13{ minutes in the Toronto Raptors' 93-88 exhibition victory over the Washington Wizards on Monday night.

The seven-foot, 250-pound Italian _ the first European ever taken No. 1 _ entered as a substitute about 5{ minutes into the game and also showed some rough edges: He picked up three personal fouls within four minutes.

``I need to improve the same things I did in Italy. It's not a whole new world. It's still basketball,'' Bargnani said. ``If I don't do well on defence, I won't be on the floor.''

Bargnani (Bar-NYAH-nee) finished 3-of-6 from the field, including 2-for-2 on threes. He finished with five fouls.

``That's just all young guys,'' Raptors coach Sam Mitchell said. ``There's no way around the growing pains. There's no short cuts.''

Still, Bargnani did draw offensive fouls from Wizards centres Brendan Haywood and Etan Thomas, both times with a bit of an exaggerated lean backward _ a veteran move by Bargnani, who turns 21 this month.

He has drawn comparisons to Dallas Mavericks all-star Dirk Nowitzki because of his height and outside touch: He made 37 percent of his three-point tries in Italy.

``It's a bit fast right now. He has to get adapted to the game,'' said Wizards All-Star guard Gilbert Arenas, who scored 29 points. ``I'd say halfway through the season is when he'll hit his stride.''

It was the first exhibition game this season between two NBA teams (others played against European squads), and Wizards coach Eddie Jordan said beforehand that Arenas wanted to play 46 of the 48 possible minutes. Turned out, Arenas played 30.

``I want to get into the rhythm quick,'' Arenas said.

Fred Jones scored 17 points, and Chris Bosh added 14 for Toronto, which overhauled its roster after a 27-55 season. Jorge Garbajosa's three-pointer with 38 seconds left broke an 88-88 tie.

Washington played its starting unit _ Arenas and free-agent addition DeShawn Stevenson at guard, Antawn Jamison and Caron Butler at forward, Haywood at centre _ for nearly the entire first quarter and much of the third. Toronto substituted more freely.

After losing in the first round of the playoffs to LeBron James and the Cleveland Cavaliers, Jordan wants his players to focus on defence. The Raptors missed their first four field goal attempts, and eight of nine, shooting 21.1 per cent in the first quarter and 38 per cent overall.

Wizards guard Jarvis Hayes saw his first action since December. He missed parts of the past two seasons with a broken right knee cap and had surgery in February.

Hayes made his first shot, a jumper 2{ minutes into the second quarter, and ended up 6-of-11 for 14 points.

``It felt good. I was real nervous coming into the game,'' Hayes said. ``I wanted to come out and get the kinks out.''