Head in the Game

Constructor: Adam Aaronson

I have zero interest in basketball but today's crossword was still a fun solve. The highlight was landing BASKETBALLIQ after plonking QUO, there were just the right number of easy crosses for the "Q" revealer to nudge everything into place. Bonus points since the shape of the grid looks like a Mario squid.

While the bottom half of the puzzle was a clean solve, I struggled (somewhat unnecessarily) with the top half. I have no familiarity with IMMANUEL QUICKLEY so I had to solve every surrounding cross before I could fathom an answer. And those surrounding crosses aren't the easiest solves, with LULU, IQUOTE, and LYNXES, the last of which I filled BOBCATS before I realized the answer had to be plural. Bad solving on my part.

Speaking of bad solving, after reading "With 9-across, Toronto Raptors shooting guard who wears #5" I somehow thought "wears #5" corresponded to the highlighted themer 9A (I was blinded by the pretty crosshatching, I guess). When QUICKLEY was revealed I was left asking myself, "is that an item of apparel?"

I have somewhat of a beef with ASTO crossing SXSW, the latter being an especially annoying Texas crosswordese. At least SXSW is self-referential in this grid and can somewhat justify its existence. ASTO is just plain bad fill and "Regarding" does nothing to redeem it.

The theme feels a little weak, in way of the longest answer only barely referencing the other two themers. I didn't even notice that the IQ in BASKETBALLIQ matches the initials of IMMANUEL QUICKLEY until I read the post-solve description and revealed the hint. But at the same time, I don't think this grid would be improved by removing BASKETBALLIQ. It's probably the best fill in the grid.

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