Courage and joy: Faith has driven Kentucky’s Immanuel Quickley to new heights as he seeks his father’s approval (2024)

LEXINGTON, Ky. — John Calipari keeps coming back to one word when he tries to explain the emergence of Immanuel Quickley as Kentucky’s most reliable performer in a game’s most stressful moments. Courage. The sophom*ore guard’s unflappable fortitude was on full display on Dec. 28 against Louisville, in ways seen and unseen. And the unseen is really the story here.

Quickley closed his eyes at the free-throw line that day, shutting out all the noise, then opened them and calmly sank two free throws to tie the game with 72 seconds to go in regulation. He made two more with 17 seconds left in overtime, sealing the first and perhaps most important of eight victories in the last nine games for the Wildcats. In doing so, Quickley reached a career high of 18 points, which he has surpassed four times since, and basked in the adulation of some 20,000 delirious fans at Rupp Arena. He brought them to a booming crescendo of cheers when he threw L’s down, the universal hand gesture for mission accomplished against Kentucky’s in-state rival, and looked positively childlike as he bounded off the court that afternoon.

But the biggest reward awaited him in the locker room. It came in the form of a text message from a friend back home in Havre de Grace, Md., just outside of Baltimore. It was a video of his father watching the final moments of the game on television, and Quickley could hardly believe his eyes. When he sank those decisive free throws, his father had been on the phone with his grandfather, describing the action in jubilant wonder. “Immanuel about to ice ‘em here!” Marcellous Quickley yelped. “He’s about to take ‘em home! Easy cake! Easy cake!”

Immanuel sat there stunned. And smiling. Those who saw him in that moment — watching him watch his father watching him — say the happiness on his face is difficult to describe. Quickley’s ascendance and the reaction it has produced back home elicits another word. Joy.

“I always knew he loved me as a person,” Quickley says of his father. “But I will say, that was one of the cooler moments of my life, just seeing him proud of me on the basketball level. We weren’t always at this place. But for him to understand that I can be an upright Christian and still play basketball at the same time is really big.”

You see, hard as it may be to believe, Marcellous Quickley has never seen his son play basketball in person. Marcellous only recently began watching his son’s games on TV. A devout member of the Pentecostal church, he has long viewed basketball as a road to perdition — a foolish distraction from the path to salvation at best, a self-edifying gateway to hell at worst.

Imagine the courage it must take as a teenager to choose the very thing your father despises, and the joy that must come from finally proving to him that your endeavor is not so bad after all. The courage it must take to resist all of the temptations your father feared and the joy that must result in finally being able to celebrate your triumphs, both athletic and spiritual, with the man whose approval means everything.

“All his dad wants is to know he’s going to do the right thing,” says Nitrease Quickley, Immanuel’s mother, “and all Immanuel wants is to know his dad is proud of him. You know, that’s all any kid wants.”

Courage and joy. This is the Immanuel Quickley story.

Just a day after he’d played hero again at Rupp Arena, knocking down 5 of 6 3-point attempts in a win over Alabama, including the dagger, Quickley barely caused a stir as he strode through the doors of Greater Faith Apostolic Church — save for one older gentleman, a nattily attired greeter who let Quickley pass with just a handshake but then hurried to catch him. In a quick conversation before the service began, he grabbed Quickley’s arm and pulled him close, leaned in and spoke softly, solemnly.

“This season you can win souls,” the man said. “You know I don’t talk to you about basketball, but people are watching you now. Show them God.”

As if receiving an order from Calipari to take the game-winning shot, which has become commonplace these days, Quickley nodded.

“I got you,” he said. “I got you.”

To hear Quickley tell it, his breakthrough on the court is tied directly to a renewed focus on his faith. He could not have made the leap from five points per game off the bench as a freshman to a starring role as a sophom*ore without first heeding his father’s warning. He loves the game too much to give it up, but he had to be sure it was not dragging him down. So this season, just as often as Kentucky fans have probably uttered, “Thank God for Immanuel Quickley,” there has been a corresponding “Thank God” from Quickley.

Now that he leads the team in 3-point and free-throw percentage and ranks second in scoring, people keep asking what has gotten into him, what has changed about him to ignite such a dramatic improvement. His answers, in order: the Holy Spirit and a willingness to talk about it, loud and proud, come whatever unbelieving rolls of the eyes it might produce. Although his name means “God is with us” and his Twitter handle is @IQ_GodSon, he admits he has not always been so steadfast.

By the time he left home for college in the summer of 2018, he was kind of a big deal, a McDonald’s All-American headed off to play at the glitziest program in college basketball. And during what became a frustrating freshman season, Quickley says, “I changed a little bit. I was going to parties and stuff. Not that there’s anything wrong with hanging out with friends.” It’s just that he could sense he’d lost his way.

“That is exactly what his dad didn’t want to happen,” Nitrease says. “Of course, our nature is we want to be exalted, to be the first in line, and sports can bring that out of you. It’s just human nature to puff yourself up a little bit. Trust me, that first year wasn’t all peaches and cream for Immanuel. That temptation was there for him. He wavered.”

But on the last night of his summer break, on the eve of his return to Kentucky for Year 2, he attended a teen event at his home church and a guest speaker altered the course of his sophom*ore season. He did not know Quickley, but he asked to pray with him.

“He was, like, prophesying over my life, telling me stuff I only knew about myself,” Quickley says. “He told me my time was now. He told me I needed to refocus my life, lock in on the things that are important, trust in God, and everything would take care of itself. I’ll never forget that night.”

Upon his return to campus, Quickley began two-a-days: a Bible-reading devotional in the morning before class and another at night before bed.

“And I decided to start showing who I was, that I’m not just a basketball player,” he says, “that I’m a Christian who happens to play basketball. I wanted to get that out there. That’s part of the reason I probably wasn’t ready to blossom last year, because I really wasn’t showing my faith and showing who I was for Jesus.”

By the time preseason rolled around and he found himself in front of microphones and cameras again, and especially after a couple of encouraging performances in early games, Quickley was telling anyone who would listen that his transformation has less to do with tireless work in the gym — although he recognizes that is a huge piece of this too — and more about the scriptures he was memorizing. His favorite, Romans 8:28, has become a theme for this season: And we know that in all things, God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.

Quickley scored 193 points in 37 games as a freshman. He already has 263 points in 19 games as a sophom*ore. Kentucky has outscored its 13 high-major opponents by 85 points with Quickley on the floor, the best plus-minus on the team. And in the most pressure-packed moments, Calipari wants the ball in Quickley’s hands. He’s 17-of-17 at the line, 6-of-12 from the field and 4-of-9 from 3-point range in the final five minutes of regulation or overtime in close games — single-digit margins — since announcing himself as Mr. Clutch against Louisville.

When Alabama stormed back from a 15-point deficit to get within three, Quickley hit two 3-pointers and a pair of decisive free throws over the final 4:35. Down six with 53 seconds left at South Carolina, he converted a three-point play. Down four with 19 ticks to go against the Gameco*cks, he sank two free throws. And down two with seven seconds left, he buried a tying fadeaway jump shot.

He sank a half-court heave to beat the halftime buzzer in an overtime win at Texas Tech last Saturday, a game in which Calipari drew up a game-winning try for Quickley in regulation that he missed before making go-ahead free throws with 47 seconds remaining in OT. After every big shot or gaudy stat line, he gives all the credit to God. Yes, he knows some will mock him for that, reasoning that a deity with a whole world to watch over surely does not concern itself with the outcome of a sporting event. And no, he’s not mad at you for thinking that.

“You can’t really fault them,” Quickley says. “I would hope that everybody would love God, but at the end of the day, I’ll still be your friend and still pick you up if you fall, even if you don’t. Everyone has to make their own choice.”

On that recent Sunday at his adopted church, where he sometimes retreats to play the drums in a soundproof booth when the building is empty, Quickley slid into a pew near the front and received his only star treatment of the service. A young boy offered a quick fist bump and whispered, “I saw you hitting those 3s yesterday.”

Then a woman at the lectern began a long, impassioned prayer by inviting the congregation to come to the edge of the stage and pray. Dozens of people did, heads bowed and hands lifted, many of them quietly speaking their own prayers — some of them with tears streaming down their faces — as the woman at the microphone shouted a request “that somebody would catch fire today!”

Quickley remained in his seat and silent, perhaps because he is already aflame. That goes for his spiritual life as well as his game. It would be sacrilegious to conflate the two, he is quick to point out, but Quickley is certain the basketball breakout would not be possible without this religious awakening.

Over the last nine games, he is averaging 16.8 points and 5.1 rebounds and has made 22 of 47 3-pointers, a scorching 47 percent. He’ll have to pull up his overall shooting percentage to get there, but he’s in pursuit of the rare 50/40/90 season: 50 percent from the field, 40 percent from 3 and 90 percent at the line. He’s chasing Tyler Herro’s school record for free-throw accuracy.

During an impressively long opening prayer, as the woman up front shouted “We thank you, Lord!” three times, Quickley quietly mouthed, “Yes, God,” before closing his eyes and drifting into a meditative place that looked just like his free-throw routine. “You can always find that quiet when your eyes are closed,” he says. “When everybody is yelling and screaming, if I can just close my eyes and kind of center myself, it’s really good for me.”

Within that peace lies the truth about what has changed for Quickley.

When a four-piece band thumped to life and a large, soulful man began belting an energetic hymn that sent the congregation into a blissful session of praise and worship, the first song was almost too perfect. “More Than Enough” by Gloria Gaynor gave away the secret to Quickley’s season. In the lyrics, a revelation of exactly why this recommitment to Christ is helping him play better, whether you share his faith or not:

So why should I worry about the highs and the lows
The ups and the downs
And by my faith I know
My God is more than enough

“It was a little bit of a confidence thing,” Quickley says. “I knew all I had to do was just be faithful. I took that into all my games, all my workouts, all my practices, and I was just really confident. That’s exactly what it is. I know that I’m not in control of my life. I know that God is in control of my life.”

When you truly believe that, what is left to fear? Poof, the pressure of living up to the five-star hype at a blue-blood program suddenly disappears. It’s amazing what a veteran player with elite talent and supreme confidence can do.

At church, Quickley used a Bible app on his phone to follow along with scriptures referenced in the sermon. He squeezed a black stress ball throughout an intense message about heaven and hell and precisely who is headed to each place. OK, so maybe not everything about this journey is care-free. Some of it is hard to hear, harder still to accept. Like a father who just won’t — or wouldn’t, for years — get on board with the most important thing in your life outside of church.

The irony of Marcellous Quickley’s stance on basketball is that he’s married to Nitrease, who played at Morgan State and attends every Kentucky game she can. In fact, Immanuel’s mom and aunt have become well-known at Rupp Arena for their bright-colored outfits and enthusiastic cheering. It is an obvious overcompensation for the family member who has always been missing from the stands during Immanuel’s games.

Even as his son became one of the 25 best players in the country for his age, representing USA Basketball at U17 and U19 world championships, Marcellous stayed away. He mentored his son in many other areas, but hoops was a non-starter. He even declined to participate in the college recruiting process, leaving one of the biggest decisions of his son’s life to Immanuel and his mother. He has never even been to Lexington for a visit.

He did send his son off to college with a letter titled “From Boys to Men,” in which he wrote about courage and character.

“We can’t take the easy way in life,” Marcellous told Immanuel. “Watch out for DISTRACTIONS. This is dangerous and deceptive.” He told a story about a lion cub who got lost and then was found by a farmer who raised it alongside his sheep. Over time, assimilating to its surroundings, the cub learned to bleat like those sheep and forgot how to roar like the lion he was. “Immanuel, I love you,” Marcellous said, signing off with: “Be who God called you to be.”

Marcellous politely declined to be interviewed for this story but shared a photo of them together and that letter.

“He wants Immanuel to be successful,” Nitrease says. “He tells him he loves him. But he really wants him to seek God more than he seeks basketball.” As she puts it, husband and wife have agreed to disagree on this one. “It’s like, hey, I went to college on a basketball scholarship and it worked for me. I’m still serving the Lord.”

Immanuel’s religious revival always seemed driven by something deeper than a stranger’s soothsaying at a summer church service. Turns out, it is as much about a father’s love as the Father’s love. Quickley remembers two things clearly from his childhood: how much he enjoyed sweeping up Marcellous’ barbershop because it meant he could eavesdrop on all of the wisdom being dispensed there and realizing at some point that something was missing whenever he played.

“Everybody has that dad who’s screaming at them, ‘Shoot the ball!’ at every game,” Immanuel says. “I didn’t have that. I kind of understood it at a young age. He’s always been in my life — it’s not like I’m a single-parent type — but he just didn’t want basketball to be the center of my life.”

But then a funny thing happened. Toward the end of last season, during the NCAA Tournament when Quickley hit two huge 3-pointers in a Sweet 16 victory over Houston, his father started secretly watching games on TV. Maybe it was only highlights, but he undoubtedly knew what his son was doing. The pride you’d expect began to bubble up. It became irrepressible.

When Quickley doubled down on his faith and became an integral part of Kentucky’s success early this season, Marcellous could no longer resist the temptation. He came out of hiding, inviting friends to watch parties at restaurants back home in Maryland. He still hasn’t attended a game, but Immanuel believes that day might be just around the corner. Recently, he started getting text messages from his dad about basketball, commentary on how he played that night or encouragement for the next day’s game. It was jarring at first.

“He said, ‘Mom, what is going on? Dad just texted about basketball!’ ” Nitrease says. “And you’re kind of like, wait, is that the same man who said don’t get into basketball and just serve the Lord? But his only desire is for his son to live a Godly life, so when you see that he is publicly living that life in such a spotlight as this, you go, Oh, well, maybe …”

Sitting in the pew less than 24 hours after lighting up Alabama, Quickley considered a message that at times felt tailored to him. The preacher put a slide on the projector screen that pretty well summed up the last several months of his life: If becoming a Christian doesn’t change who you are and how you behave, you are deceived.

Quickley nodded. He squeezed his eyes shut. The stress ball disappeared inside the palm of his hand.

“Last season was hard,” he says. “It was definitely a lesson. I think it was God just speaking to me, letting me know that I’m not bigger than Him. That I need Him. That I need to be spreading my faith. That I can’t do this without letting people know that I’m a Christian first.”

On the way out of that Sunday service, the man who’d cornered Quickley on the way in was waiting with one more message.

“I’m proud of you,” he told Quickley, who smiled wide.

In that moment, his face was a portrait of both courage and joy.

(Top photo: Andy Lyons/Getty Images)