After a promising rookie season, Justin Edwards came back and had a bad summer league. He had a bad preseason as well — so much so that he was essentially out of the rotation by the time the regular season started,
despite two forwards in Paul George and Trendon Watford not being healthy for opening night.
While his playing time was waning, his coach still hadn’t lost faith in him.
“I think I’ve said this to you guys before like, I love him, I don’t worry about him,” head coach Nick Nurse said after a 102-100 win over the Boston Celtics. “He has a bad game, it doesn’t even phase me because I love him.”
In the first 10 games of the season, Edwards had racked up three DNP-CDs. Two of the games he had appeared in he played less than 10th minutes. He averaged four points per game and shot just 38.7% from the field.
When his number was called early in the 11th game of the year against Boston, he was ready. Edwards dropped a team-high 22 points shooting 8-of-9 from the floor. Even when he was off target it benefitted his team — his only miss of the night fell right into Kelly Oubre Jr.’s hands for the game-winning put-back with 8.7 seconds remaining.
Despite how hot he was, Edwards wasn’t exactly confident when Maxey kicked it to him, but everything went right for him that night.
“It didn’t feel good, but I shot it,” Edwards said of his last attempt, “and like I said, a game-winning miss — a little joke, K9 tapped it in, so it all worked out in my favor.”
“Oh, definitely. It’s great not just for the team but to him,” said Quentin Grimes. “Hats off to him, he played amazing.”
Coming into a game cold and completely catching fire is what Edwards is always preparing for. The cliche amongst NBA benches is “always staying ready.” He credited the work he puts in at practice for how was able to do so. He pinpointed a moment in practice in which he knew he had earned his coach’s trust.
“That means a lot coming from Nick, actually. We had a little moment in practice, maybe like a month ago,” Edwards said. “I was sitting on the sideline and he was like, ‘I’m not worried about you and you shouldn’t be worried about yourself and it’s all going to work out’. So, you know, that honestly shows that I’ve been waiting my turn and today was my day.”
As a Philadelphia native, he was able to have his day in his hometown with family in attendance. Edwards has been a pretty even-keeled guy since getting to the NBA, but he showed quite a lot of emotion, especially during his fourth quarter heater in which he hit three straight three-pointers that erased the Sixers’ deficit.
“Yeah, and then especially in my hometown, it gave me chills, low-key,” Edwards said,.“Then I had to like, snap back in because I was zoned out honestly. Everything was just happening so fast.”
That “zoning out” is something that Edwards actually credited with helping him find his shot again. The advice came from assistant coach Rico Hines in a shooting drill.
“Actually in one of my workouts I had to go 20-for-25 in five spots,” he said. “Rico was like, you just got to zone out, and I guess that’s what he meant by it because I just was shooting and wasn’t even really thinking about it.”
Edwards’ spot in the rotation is far from guaranteed going forward, but he’s seemingly mastered the “stay ready” mentality so his number can be called at any time.
“It’s a make-or-miss league. I can’t really beat myself up on the misses,” he said. “Even on the makes I can’t get too high, you know, I gotta stay levelheaded. I’m just going back to the drawing board and continuing to work.”
That work is a big reason why he has earned more than trust — love, in fact — from his head coach.
