Quentin Grimes did nearly everything in his power to earn his first win as a member of the Philadelphia 76ers. In their 126-119 victory over the Golden State Warriors, he led all players in scoring and got his team into the win column.
Grimes dropped 44 points on 18-24 shooting from the field, including 6-9 from deep. Had he done a better job from the foul line, where he went 2-8, he could have notched his first 50-piece. Instead, he settled for his first 40-piece and helped the Sixers snap a nine-game losing streak.
“Exactly what we told him to do before the game,” Nick Nurse joked.
Grimes said he really started to feel his heater coming in the third quarter. Continuing his hot shooting after a 20-point half was the clear indicator that this game was different for him. It took just three quarters for Grimes to clear his previous career-high mark of 36.
“I feel like last time, the last game in New York, [I] didn’t come out as aggressive as I should have and we let up the gas at the end,” he said, referring to the Sixers’ 110-105 loss to the New York Knicks from this past Wednesday. “But most importantly, just coming out here being aggressive, trying to help my team get a win.”
Quentin Grimes sets new career high in 76ers’ win over Warriors
The 76ers improved to just 17 games below .500 with this win. They still have their sights set on a playoff berth and can use a win like this, which came against a red-hot Stephen Curry and Warriors team that regained momentum in the fourth quarter, to springboard themselves forward.
“It’s a big confidence boost,” Grimes said. “It was a lot of games that we were close and that we should have won, so I feel like with this game, it was a game that we had to come together collectively within the last two, three minutes of the game…We could have lost that game easily but we stuck together, stayed tough and that feels like a game that we can build on.”
The 76ers certainly earned this win through proper execution in crunch time, but the massive disparity in three-point percentage — they shot 57.6 percent from deep while Golden State shot just 28.6 percent — suggests they got pretty lucky. Tyrese Maxey shot 2-14 as a finger injury dogged him for a second straight game. Philly has a lot to figure out as it heads into the final full month of the NBA regular season. But it can also breathe for a second and enjoy its victory against a good (yet shorthanded without Jimmy Butler) Dubs team.
Quentin Grimes has played in plenty of tough-minded situations throughout his basketball career. The 76ers’ treacherous quest to earn a postseason bid will require the team to dig deep and play its best basketball. Through one of the newcomers, the Sixers just got an excellent example to build off of.
“He was on one tonight,” Nurse said. “It’s pretty cool to see.”
