Trae Young Has 1st Signature Moment with Wild Game-Winner vs. Spurs
By Chris Guest
The Atlanta Hawks played a preseason game against the San Antonio Spurs on Wednesday night that ended in scintillating fashion – at the hands of new point guard Trae Young.
Trae Young has been the center of much of attention surrounding the Atlanta Hawks this offseason and with good reason. As a sweet-shooting and eminently likable baby-faced point guard, he makes the team’s rebuild all the more enjoyable as fans watch him grow and learn before their eyes.
Anyone who has been following Trae Young since before and during his college days knows that his three-point range is almost limitless, and clearly Hawks GM Travis Schlenk believes this as well.
After being a much-ballyhooed prospect because of his shooting, Trae Young had underwhelmed up to this point in his Summer League and Preseason career. But all of that occurred before Young did this to end the preseason contest between the Spurs and Hawks:
That’s right Hawks fans. Finally, Trae Young’s insane three-point range came to fruition. Was it during the early portion of the second quarter? No. Was it during the dingiest stretches of a garbage time blowout? No. Not at all.
Trae Young just WON THE GAME by dusting off the San Antonio Spurs with an astonishingly deep three-pointer “from the G in Georgia Tech,” according to Fox Sports Southeast play-by-play commentator (and Atlanta sports treasure) Bob Rathbun. Let’s peep another angle of that shot, shall we?
https://twitter.com/SportsCenter/status/1050206677549678592
Just look at that steely expression after he drills it. Maybe Ice Trae is indeed the most fitting nickname for the new Hawks point guard. He nailed this 30-footer (which again was a GAME-WINNER) as if he was at practice, not in the throes of a hard-fought preseason NBA game with 2.2 seconds left on the clock.
Trae Young has yet to play a single regular season game that actually counts towards his career stats, but you know what? Right now, that doesn’t matter.
With a single magnificent, eye-popping shot from 30 feet out, he became the toast of NBA fans on a dreary night in October. If Young can get The Action Network’s Rob Perez to change his Twitter handle for a night to “Trwob Young,” then you how Ice Trae did something right.
Let’s take one more look at the shot, just for good measure.
Magnificent.
Let’s hope this is the first of many signature moments in Trae Young’s career, but for now, let’s just bask in the glory of a game-winner from distances heretofore unexplored for NBA three-point shooters.
Never change, Trae.