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Immanuel Quickley is back to help save the Raptors' half-court offence

10 November 2024Last Update :
Immanuel Quickley is back to help save the Raptors' half-court offence

INGLEWOOD, CALIF. — Toronto Raptors point guard Immanuel Quickley sprinted to the right, felt the Los Angeles Clippers defence fall off him and let it rip.

Quickley hadn’t played the last 8 1/2 games, having suffered a pelvic contusion near the end of the first half on opening night. Ultimately, the Raptors paid him a ton of money this summer to be one of the players who takes the biggest shots, regardless of the circumstances.

Rust be damned, the shot was pure.

“I’ve just shot thousands and thousands of shots in my career,” Quickley said after the Raptors’ 105-103 loss Saturday, accounting for the confidence to take such a big shot in his first game back. “It’s just another shot. Just happens to be fans in the building, you guys here, shot clock (running), popcorn popping, drinks selling. But it’s a shot that I’ve shot over and over again.”

Quickley tied the score with the 3, forcing a Clippers timeout. As he made his way down the court, Quickley pounded his chest, yelling, “I’m him.”

As is becoming a theme, he couldn’t help the Raptors finish out a close game, with the point guard and RJ Barrett missing key layups. After rough fourth quarters in losses at the Denver Nuggets and Sacramento Kings, though, Quickley’s final spurt to get the Raptors back into the game was auspicious stuff. The Raptors won the fourth quarter 33-24.

“He was just turned up, and he obviously turned us up offensively, defensively,” Ochai Agbaji said. “He brought a lot for us tonight.”

The Raptors played five games without their top offensive creators: Quickley and Scottie Barnes. Four of those games were against teams with playoff aspirations in the Western Conference. The other was against the Charlotte Hornets. None of the teams has been great defensively to start the season, but most are competent.

The Raptors scored at a rate of 118.5 points per 100 possessions in those games, sixth best in the league. That’s pretty dang good for a team that wasn’t — isn’t — expected to be a top offensive team when healthy, never mind when it is short-handed.

“I think the message that we’ve tried to hit home on offence and the pace and the style of play that we try to play out every single night has been there,” Agbaji said Saturday morning. “Darko (Rajaković, the Raptors’ head coach) has voiced it to us that he sees us doing better at it game by game — our offence becoming better and better.”

Davion Mitchell and Jamal Shead did well in Quickley’s place. At some point, you need elite shooting talent. Quickley saved some bleak-looking half-court possessions, making up for what was largely a lethargic offensive performance by the entire team for most of the night.

In a truncated night of work as he gets his conditioning back, Quickley looked at once rusty and dangerous. He was at his best in the final stint of his 26-minute outing, with a few creative assists and a running bank shot to bail the team out on a going-nowhere possession. He finished with 21 points.

It wasn’t that smooth all night, but Quickley will make a difference. It isn’t this simple, but it’s not much more complicated: Sometimes you just need a player who will cause defenders to go under screens, or at least have to think about it. The Raptors have been getting by because they have pushed the pace and pounded the offensive glass. To make meaningful gains in the half court, they need players who make defenders make some tough decisions. The Clippers played a disciplined game that shut off those avenues, but Quickley allowed the Raptors to stay in it.

It had been a while since a Raptors guard put a defender on his hip; Quickley did it a few times early on, getting himself a floater, drawing extra attention that gave Agbaji an offensive rebounding opportunity and finding Jakob Poeltl on some pocket passes. Poeltl’s finishing wasn’t up to the task.

A shot Quickley missed might have been the most encouraging moment. Gradey Dick has made it onto the opposition’s scouting report with his recent play. With the defence loaded up on him, he threw a cross-court pass to Quickley for an open corner 3. He missed it, with Agbaji cleaning it up, but the fact that Dick has the skill to make that play now and has a shooter as good as Quickley to find is promising. Dick has shown extra off-the-ball chops while the stars have been out, and the thought of having another elite shooter out there to finish drive-kick-drive-kick basketball is exciting.

Overall, Quickley was hesitant to take some contested 3s the Raptors needed him to shoot. He was more himself in the second half, and he should continue to find his rhythm. The confidence didn’t go anywhere.

Notes

• Rajaković went with a “who is playing the best” crunchtime lineup, which meant Barrett was on the bench for most of the game and Bruno Fernando was playing ahead of Poeltl. Fernando has mostly been relegated to low-leverage minutes lately. He stayed ready, making a few massive plays for the Raptors, including a thunderous dunk off a pass from Quickley.

Rajaković said he will continue to use the players who are most effective down the stretch in any given game.

• Trailing by 3, the Raptors inbounded the ball to Poeltl, a poor free-throw shooter. The Clippers, with a foul to give, fouled Poeltl. Next time, the same thing. The Clippers were fouling whoever caught the ball, switching all screens to ensure no breakdowns. The Raptors had no timeouts, so they needed to get 3 points from the possession. The big man shouldn’t have been on the floor.

It didn’t end up mattering. Poeltl hit the first free throw and missed the second intentionally. He got his own rebound but missed the tying put-back effort. Rajaković said he thought Poeltl might have had a pass available to Quickley, but that’s a big ask in such a chaotic situation for a player not used to kicking it out from the paint.

• The Intuit Dome is a cool arena, but it’s cooler to walk toward the building from the outside. It is the most distinctive-looking structure in the NBA (sorry to the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, N.Y.) and has several backboards and rims, a full-sized court and a giant big screen, with plenty of room to stand and chat before you enter. Cool building. Now, the Clippers need to fill it.

• The Clippers fans standing at (on? in?) The Wall held up pictures of maple leaves when the Raptors were shooting free throws on that end. Not the maple leaf on the flag but actual maple leaves. Kind of interesting.

• Mitchell might be the fastest Raptor. He ran away from James Harden and the Clippers like a scatback runs away from a defensive tackle.

• With Quickley back, Shead was the 10th Raptor to get in the game, checking in to start the second quarter. Within 130 seconds, he drew an offensive foul. Shead didn’t play in the second half.

• You don’t expect that little pull-up jumper, against the shot clock, from Agbaji. He’s having a nice start to the season. He had 21 points on 9-for-14 shooting.

(Photo of Immanuel Quickley and Clippers guard Terance Mann: Jayne Kamin-Oncea / Imagn Images)

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