Immanuel Quickley has high expectations of himself.
He has two lofty personal goals for this season.
“I would like to attempt to recover from 40 [percent] from 3, obviously,” he said Saturday. “Overall, I would like to be over 50 [percent].”
Tough.
He’s off to a powerful start from the sector, to date shooting 47.3 percent after shooting a career-best 44.8 percent a yr ago.
Quickley, nevertheless, has not found the touch from the 3-point line yet.
He’s just at 32.6 percent after making 37 percent of his tries from beyond the arc last yr.
“I’m going to attempt to get it,” he said of his goals. “Should you set a goal for yourself, you’re going to attempt to get it. So I’m going to attempt to get it.”
Quickley is off to an excellent start, averaging 15.1 points per game together with 3.5 assists and three.3 rebounds.
He’s putting up those numbers in only 24.1 minutes, down from his 28.9 a yr ago.
That’s partly on account of a glut of guards on the roster after the addition of guard Donte DiVincenzo.
Quickley doesn’t seem bothered by it, though.
“It’s [not] necessarily how long you’re in the sport, but what you do whilst you’re in the sport that matters,” the fourth-year guard said. “I attempt to keep that mindset.”
When asked about Quickley’s minutes being down to date this season, coach Tom Thibodeau joked that the minutes police were back.
In fact, previously he has been criticized for taking part in players too many minutes as an alternative of not enough of them.
“The one thing we ask everybody is to sacrifice,” Thibodeau said. “You could possibly make a case that Quick is a starter, Donte is a starter, Josh [Hart] is a starter. They’re sacrificing that for the team.”
The Knicks are surprisingly last within the NBA in blocked shots per game (1.9), but coach Tom Thibodeau doesn’t consider top rim-protector Mitchell Robinson is falling off though he’s technically rejecting fewer shots.
“Even when Mitch isn’t getting the block, he’s impacting shots,” the coach said of Robinson, who is obstructing 1.0 shots per game after notching 1.8 last season. “I feel sometimes statistics could be deceiving. Oftentimes people are likely to correlate high steals with playing good defense and oftentimes it’s dangerous gambles that you just get to, and also you’re breaking the defense down 10 times. So it’s not good but there appears to be a premium on that and to me, I’m more, play the ball properly, have the suitable help, read the ball properly, challenge the shots, finish your defense, be disciplined.
“And I feel that’s one in all the largest areas where he’s grown is the discipline that he has. Now he’s not picking up low cost fouls. We’re playing very hard without fouling. So he’s grown in that area tremendously.”
