The end of the summer is near, and the 76ers are battling for a title.
It’s just not a battle being fought on real-life hardwoods.
In June, 76ers Gaming Club took home a $100,000 cash prize for winning THE TURN, an in-season NBA 2K League 5v5 tournament. Shooting guard Enrique “630” Xavier Barraza averaged 22.5 points and 4.5 assists en route to winning tournament MVP. Point guard Andre “Dre” Marshall contributed 21.5 points and 8 assists.
General manager and head coach Jeff Terrell recognizes how unique it is to have such an explosive backcourt. “Last year, going into the draft, 630 was somebody that was definitely on my radar,” Terrell told The Painted Lines on Thursday.
“He went before our pick, but he was somebody that wanted to come to Philly. I knew about it prior to the draft last year. And then, just being able to pair those two in the same backcourt on the same team is special. It’s like you got an all-star backcourt, to be honest with you. You got MVP from last year, Rookie of the Year. And then this year, Dre’s an MVP finalist. So, their talent is special in the way that they work together on court and off court is something that has really stood out to me.”
630, who also goes by “Sav”, is the second star guard, albeit in a different capacity of basketball, to have his eyes on Philadelphia in the last 18 months. “Just the winning culture, the organization, as a whole, and, obviously, Jeff,” he said of what drew him to Philly.
“Jeff is a very animated coach and I played basketball my whole life. So, I kind of always wanted that type of coach to be in the background, just yelling like motivation and giving us the hype energy and I felt like I was really missing that in the league. So, that really drew me to the 76ers.”
630 was drafted by Pacers Gaming with the second overall pick in the 2021 NBA 2K League draft. He won Rookie of the Year and MVP, leading the Pacers to the league’s hierarchy in his first campaign. But, they were eliminated from the playoffs in the first round. After starting this season 1-4, the Pacers traded 630 to 76ersGC for Reizey and a 2023 first-round pick.
Rather than taking the stunning blockbuster to heart, 630 is re-channeling it into positivity. “It definitely kind of motivated me because, like you said, doing everything for the organization, winning all the awards. But, coming here, it was definitely a…
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