He learned that good and bad are inevitably intertwined, not long after he was old enough for his driver’s licence.
He enrolled at the University of Kentucky as a teenager, signing on to play for one of the NCAA’s premier basketball programs with a fanatical fanbase. He didn’t have to wait too long to find out that having a public-facing job has some downsides.
“I learned that at a young age, because when I was at Kentucky, there were people in my (direct messages) like ‘kill yourself,'” Quickley told me in an interview as the Toronto Raptors were preparing for Wednesday night’s game against the Charlotte Hornets. “I was like, ‘Dang, why would anyone say that?’ And then you learn that it comes with the job. It’s nothing crazy. But then when you play well, it’s like everybody goes ‘ahhh’. So you learn to never get too high, never get too low.”
It’s a hard-earned perspective. It was tested at times when he broke into the NBA with the New York Knicks. He always shouldered it.
“It’s tough sometimes, but that’s the mentality he has,” said RJ Barrett, who played three seasons with Quickley on the Knicks before they were traded to Toronto just over two years ago. “Coming from New York, it’s like, ‘who cares man, just keep shooting.'”
So you get the sense that Quickley wasn’t likely to be rattled by his recent run of play, which has included being pulled in the fourth quarter in two of the Raptors’ last four games before his start against the Hornets on Wednesday.
He wasn’t rattled, even, after going 1-of-7 from three through the first three quarters.
At that point, Quickly was shooting just 25.6 per cent (10-of-39) from three over his last 19 quarters of basketball.
And it’s good he hasn’t internalized the criticism of his play or questions about his contract, deemed too rich at $32.5 million per year for three more seasons after this one, for a player who is still learning the nuances of being a point guard. It’s a good thing he’s still willing to step into shots when they haven’t been falling.
That willfulness was the difference in the Raptors’ extremely unlikely buzzer-beating 97-96 win over the Hornets on Wednesday. The win improved their record to 23-15 and pulled them within a game of the third-place Celtics in the East, with the Raptors travelling to Boston on Friday.
There were countless reasons to lose, but Quickley, who scored eight of 21 points in the fourth quarter as the Raptors came back from down 10, was still willing to take a shot so they could win.
Eventually, one would go in, right?
He wasn’t the only Raptor who struggled. As a group, Toronto was firing at the rim like it was a moving target. Heading into the fourth quarter, the Raptors shot 3-of-27 from deep, which is hard to do. It’s even harder to do that and still have a shadow of a chance to win the game. But somehow the Raptors trailed by only six.
Their defence was keeping them in it, but for how long?
And that wasn’t the least of it. The Raptors’ leading scorer, Brandon Ingram (six points on 2-of-7 shooting), played just 11 minutes after jamming his thumb early in the first quarter. X-rays were negative, but that good news didn’t help the Raptors’ offence. And then Scottie Barnes (17 points on 6-of-14), who was driving the Raptors’ attack most of the night, was limited to just over four minutes in the fourth quarter as he left for a bit to get his knee checked out.
It turned out to be fine, but he didn’t get back on the floor until there was 1:48 left to play.
But somehow, with Ingram done and Barnes out, the Raptors were able to claw their way back against a Hornets team (13-24) that was fresh off a blowout win on the road against the Oklahoma City Thunder and was 9-9 in the past 18 games, including two straight wins over the Raptors.
Quickley helped get things rolling when he hit a three early in the fourth and cut through the defence for a lay-up to cut the Hornets’ lead to three.
“It’s just what the game is, honestly,” he said of his willingness to stick with it when he’s struggling. “This is my sixth year, so you understand that sometimes you literally just don’t make shots, and sometimes you cannot miss at all. So you know it has to balance out at some point.”
From there, it was Barrett who took on most of the heavy lifting. Without Ingram available, any notion of the minutes limit he was playing on after missing five weeks with a knee injury went out the window.
Instead, the mission was to create offence, which Barrett did by getting his shoulders downhill towards the rim and not stopping until he got into the paint and could rise up, often through contact. It was a side of his game not seen as often this season, as the Raptors roster has deepened and its offence diversified. But it was badly needed, and Barrett was happy to provide it.
“I’ve always said that I’m here to do whatever the team needs me to do to win,” said Barrett, who scored 16 of his 28 points in the fourth quarter, while adding seven rebounds. “So tonight, (it was) to make those plays down the stretch. Other nights, it’s been play defence and cut. Other nights it’s been get a lot of assists. Like, whatever it is that team needs me to do. I’m going to try to do that every night.”
Barrett’s three midway through the fourth gave the Raptors their first lead since the opening minutes of the second quarter, but they still needed more. He obliged.
The Mississauga, Ont. native drove through a foul, finished and hit a free throw with 56.4 seconds left, which tied the score, and then his high-arching fadeaway over multiple defenders tied the score again with 20.1 seconds to play.
But it all seemed like a wasted effort, all the digging in on the defensive for 48 minutes — the Raptors stayed in the game by holding Charlotte to 39-percent shooting and forcing 18 turnovers — seemingly undone when Hornets’ LaMelo Ball cut past Quickley and through the paint to score a go-ahead lay-up with 1.6 seconds to play.
Raptors head coach Darko Rajakovic drew up a play the team had used before. It had multiple options, but trailing by two with less than two seconds left, the first option was to spring Quickley open for a three. A hard screen by Barnes got the Raptors point guard open, and a smart ball fake by inbounds passer Sandro Mamukelashvili created a lane for the pass to be delivered on target and in rhythm.
And Quickley? Running to his left on a tight semi-circle, taking him outside the three-point line, he had only one thought as he timed the catch:
“I wasn’t making as many shots as I wanted to, but I said (to myself) if I get this, I’m going to try to end it.”
He did. The 26-footer never touched the rim. There was never any doubt. Quickley was playing in his 361st NBA game and knew even as the ball went up that he had hit the first walk-off game winner of his career.
“When it went up, I was like, ‘that has to be good because I haven’t made a shot all night.’”
Then came the bedlam as he was engulfed by his teammates. Later in the dressing room, it was the traditional water-bottle shower and the player-of-the-game chain.
“I mean, being on an NBA stage to hit a game-winner is unlike any feeling,” he told me afterwards. “…Celebrating with your teammates is probably the coolest part.”
And yes, he was on his phone later. He called his friends. He talked to his girlfriend. The texts and DMs were rolling. The vibes? Perfect. He was saving a call to his mom for a quiet moment later.
It was all just as he’d imagined it. The questions and doubts and ups and downs of being an NBA point guard, of performing with a spotlight shining on your every move, good or bad, could wait for another day or two to come rushing back in.
For one night, it was all perfect.
Barrett brings it: It was vintage Barrett in the fourth, though a version he hasn’t had to dust off very often this season. He came into Wednesday’s game averaging just 14.2 shots per game, the lowest since his rookie year. He’s played some of his best basketball, however, as his 37.5-per-cent three-point rate (before Wednesday) and his 59.3 True Shooting percentage were each career highs. He took 10 of his 25 shots in the fourth quarter, making seven.
His teammates were appreciative: “He was big time, big time,” said Quickley. “The way he can get to the rim so easily and create for his teammates, he was just big time.”
Imagine if he had two good thumbs: While Raptors rookie Collin Murray-Boyles was working over the Miami Heat for nine offensive rebounds back on Dec. 23, he sprained his left thumb, which is a problem because he’s left-handed. He wears a fairly substantial wrap on it — he described it as a cast when I spoke to him about it on Wednesday morning. You can see him favour it at times during games. But two good thumbs or not, Murray-Boyles has continued to get his hands on the basketball at a high rate. He posted a career-high 15 rebounds — including six on the offensive glass — against Charlotte, one of the best rebounding teams in the league.
The Hornets are the closest NBA team to his hometown of Columbia, S.C., and Murray-Boyles had about 20 friends and family make the 90-minute drive north — less than the 40 or so who made it out for his first game in Charlotte — to see the Raptors rookie do what he does best: get his hands on the basketball, sprained thumb or not.
No more Bamba: The Raptors were considering the possibility of bringing backup centre Mo Bamba back on a 10-day contract that would have begun Thursday or Friday in Boston. They had waived him on Tuesday to avoid his contract guarantee for the rest of the season had he been on the roster against Charlotte.
The timing also opened the door to adding him back after the 48-hour waiver period had cleared. But with Jakob Poeltl on track to return from his back issues — he worked out again with coaches on Wednesday in Charlotte and is scheduled to practise with the team in Boston on Thursday — the Raptors decided not to bring back Bamba, with part of the reason being that the $140,000 they would have to pay him on a 10-day would add to their luxury-tax bill.
One name to keep in mind is Tony Bradley, who was recently waived by the Indiana Pacers. But in general, it sounds like the play of Murray-Boyles, Barnes and the pending return of Poeltl means the Raptors are going to be selective on when and how they use 10-day signings at least until the trade deadline, when they are hoping to trim their luxury-tax bill for the season.
