Wow. What a game.
In a game in which they briefly lost their star to a scary knee injury, shot 11/36 from three, got out-rebounded, and went down by as many as 14 points in the second half, the New York Knicks still somehow found a way to steal a road game against the Victor Wembanyama-led San Antonio Spurs in Game 1 of the NBA Finals.
Let’s discuss a few things I took away from the game.
KAT was awesome.
To beat a team that has Victor Wembanyama, you desperately need your front court to hold their own. And despite his normal running mate in Mitchell Robinson was severely hampered with a broken hand, Karl-Anthony Towns was able to do just that. In addition to pouring in 18 points on an efficient 7/15 from the floor, KAT also defended extremely well and made life incredibly difficult for Wemby. His physicality and rebounding was omnipresent all night. Just another impressive performance in what has been a potentially legacy-defining run from “The Big Purr.'“
Jalen Brunson is one gutsy motherf***er.
After a slow start from the field, matters only got worse for Jalen Brunson when Harrison Barnes fell and landed on his leg towards the end of the first quarter. The awkward fall left Brunson in seemingly serious pain, as he limped up the court before heading back to the locker room. But Brunson wouldn’t let an injury end his night. He returned to the game, and began to gain confidence as the game wore on. By the fourth quarter, he was his normal clutch self, putting the game on ice with a plethora of big buckets. Can’t question his heart.
Mitch Johnson simply has to trust Dylan Harper before it’s too late.
This one still gets me worked up thinking about it now. Despite watching Dylan Harper score 16 points on 6/10 shooting, grab 8 rebounds, and nab a steal on defense in just 28 minutes of action, Spurs head coach Mitch Johnson decided to pull his rookie phenom with just under 5 minutes left in favor of veteran guard De’Aaron Fox. Unfortunately, Fox was mostly bad down the stretch (0 points, 0 assists, 2 turnovers in the 4th) on both ends of the floor, and the Knicks subsequently pulled away and stole the game. And this isn’t the first time Johnson has done this. He has consistently chosen to blindly trust Fox to close games, with varying degrees of success. And if he doesn’t start to realize what he has in Harper — and fast — he might cost his team a shot at a ring.
That massive stretch from the New York bench.
When Jalen Brunson went down with a knee injury that forced him to run back to the locker room, it put the Knicks in a perilous position. Suddenly, Jose Alvarado, Landry Shamet, and Deuce McBride were forced to enter the game and carry the burden of sparking the New York offense. As a Knicks fan in that moment, you’d probably just be happy if they didn’t completely de-combust in the non-Brunson minutes and go down by double digits. And not only did they not blow up, they held their own. Alvarado ran the offense with a veteran poise, while Shamet and McBride drilled timely threes. Instead of Brunson having to dig the Knicks out of a massive hole upon his return, he entered the game with more than a fighting chance. So, big shout out to the New York second unit.
Josh Hart is a demon.
While most of the headlines this morning will be about Jalen Brunson’s late heroics or Karl-Anthony Towns’s defense on Wemby, I just can’t say enough about what Josh Hart means to this New York Knicks team. Sure, he only had 3 points. Sure, he was 0/3 on mostly wide open threes. But his value on the court last night was immense. He had 15 (!) rebounds, 6 assists, 4 steals, and was a +22 in box plus/minus. Once again, Hart showed that he is the glue holding this Knicks team together. And when he excels, they tend to be nearly impossible to beat.
6. Josh Hart is the most clutch 3 point shooter in NBA history when there is less than 1.5 seconds on the shot clock