SALT LAKE CITY — Immanuel Quickley returned from a knee injury and shot well, but was limited to 18 minutes as Tom Thibodeau continued to navigate his guard surplus.
The 24-year-old backup, who is headed toward free agency in the summer, didn’t have a problem with his minutes.
“Just whatever minutes you get, go out there and be effective,” said Quickley, whose playing time has been cut about four minutes per game from last season. “Whatever minutes I get — whether 15, 20, 25. I played 55 [in an overtime game] last season. Whatever minutes I get, go out there and help the team win.”
Quickley missed the previous contest with knee soreness, which he said caught him off guard.
“I really don’t know [what happened],” Quickley said. “I worked out the night before, woke up and my knee was hurting. And it was hard for me to walk.”
Still, Quickley said he wasn’t held back by a minutes restriction and felt good on the court.
He shot 6-for-8 with 15 points, as one of only two perimeter players (along with Julius Randle) to connect on his field goals at over 50 percent.
But Quickley’s defense was also an issue (the Knicks were outscored by 13 points with him on the court), and Thibodeau said he rode with the hot hands down the stretch.
Quickley, often a closer, only played four minutes in the fourth quarter.
“We got a little momentum with the group that we finished with,” Thibodeau said. “We were searching.”
The other rotational guards had varying success Wednesday.
Quentin Grimes struggled while scoring just two points on four shots in 16 minutes. Donte DiVincenzo started and got the bulk of the shooting guard minutes while scoring 21 points on 6 of 13 shooting.
Wednesday was the first game for the Knicks this season in high altitude, with the thinness in Salt Lake City’s air only rivaled in the NBA by Denver’s.
Jalen Brunson, who played in the Western Conference for four seasons, said there’s no big secret to managing the altitude. He just burns out his lungs early.
“Get your first wind fast. That’s been my thought process with it. Get your first wind fast, just go from there,” Brunson said. “It’s more mental than anything for me. I just try to get over that hump.”
But what does first wind mean?
“Basically you want to exert your energy to where you’re kind of tired and then all of the sudden you’re fine,” Brunson said. “Just make sure you get over that first hump of just playing through a little shortness of breath or whatever. Basically just get through it.”
Brunson wasn’t bothered by the timing of his injury in garbage minutes last week, when Thibodeau kept in his starters for the final seconds of a blowout defeat.
“It just happens,” Brunson said. “I mean, that could happen in the first minute, first seconds, it could happen in the last seconds. It is what it is.”
Brunson suffered a sprained ankle after stepping on Boston’s Payton Pritchard with about 20 seconds left Friday and the Knicks staring at a 12-point deficit. However, the All-Star hopeful returned the next game — a victory Monday over the Raptors — and said he wasn’t hindered by pain after playing 37 minutes.