New York Knicks' guard Jalen Brunson reacts while watching from the bench during the second half of Game 1 in his team's second-round playoffs series against the Philadelphia 76ers on Monday in New York.Seth Wenig/The Associated Press
The New York Knicks are now the favourites to win the Eastern Conference in the sportsbooks and they sure look like it on the court.
The first team to win three straight postseason games by at least 25 points is looking more and more like the one that could make New York’s first NBA finals appearance in the 2000s.
With laughably lopsided scoring margins that resemble UConn women’s basketball more than the NBA, the Knicks have gone from trailing in the first round to a quick lead over the Philadelphia 76ers in the East semi-finals, with Game 2 at Madison Square Garden on Wednesday.
“We’re playing well at the right time, but I think we have room to grow,” coach Mike Brown said.
Hard to imagine, because his team is at a level never seen before in the postseason.
A 126-97 victory over Atlanta in Game 5, when the Knicks led by 32, was followed by a 140-89 romp in the clincher, when New York built a 61-point bulge. Pouncing on a Philadelphia team that barely had time to catch its breath after needing seven games in the first round, the Knicks went up by 40 on Monday in a 138-97 victory.
Counting their victory in Game 4 against the Hawks to even that series, the Knicks have won four in a row by 135 points.
Jalen Brunson is averaging 27.6 points, third among all players in the postseason. Karl-Anthony Towns is playing perhaps the best all-around basketball of his career, with his first two playoff triple-doubles as the Knicks rely on their all-star centre to initiate some of their offence with his passing. He’s providing six assists per game along with his 10.6 rebounds.
Forward OG Anunoby, always known as a defender first, is shooting beyond Stephen Curry levels from the outside, making 59 per cent of his three-pointers and 63.8 per cent of his shots overall. The bench is playing so well that Josh Hart, who last season was second in the NBA in minutes per game and always wants to be on the floor, said he’s fine now raising his hand for a break if he’s tired.
Josh Hart of the New York Knicks falls to the court after a play during the second quarter of Game 1 of his team's series against the Philadelphia 76ers at Madison Square Garden on Monday.Al Bello/Getty Images
Defensively, their physicality so rattled the 76ers that Brown said of the 16 50-50 balls in the game, the Knicks came up with 14 of them.
“We were sitting here watching it like, ‘Man, we can’t believe what we’re actually watching here,’” former Knicks star Carmelo Anthony said of the defence during NBC’s studio coverage of the game.
The Detroit Pistons had the East’s best record in the regular season. The Cleveland Cavaliers had become the betting favourites after acquiring James Harden, then the odds shifted to the Celtics after Jayson Tatum’s strong return helped them earn the No. 2 seed.
But the Celtics are gone, and the Pistons and Cavaliers had to slog through seven-game struggles to reach their second-round matchup. Now it’s the Knicks who are listed as solid favourites to emerge from the East and behind only defending champion Oklahoma City and San Antonio to win the title.
The Knicks haven’t reached the NBA Finals since 1999 and haven’t won the championship since 1973. They didn’t care what outsiders thought of their chances before the season and that hasn’t changed now.
“Boston was the favourite last series, and they came back 3-1,” Hart said, referring to the 76ers’ comeback. “So being the favourite means literally nothing. Every game you have to come in with a focus and attention to detail. And if you don’t do that, you can lose to anybody in this league. If you do that, you know, we feel like we can beat anybody.”
The Knicks have been building toward this, reaching the East semi-finals for four straight years and advancing to the conference finals last year for the first time since 2000. They surprisingly fired Tom Thibodeau after that and hired Brown, who downplayed the idea of a mandate to go further but is certainly aware that was the expectation.
New York went 53-29 but had puzzling patterns of lackluster play, such as a 2-9 stretch not long after winning the NBA Cup in December, and the back-to-back losses to the Hawks.
“That’s why you play a season. That’s why you go through the ups and downs of the season. That’s why you go through adversity,” Brunson said. “You find things to make you the best team as possible by the end of the year, and you continue to work. And even when you’re at this point, you continue to find ways to get better and improve.”
It appears in the last week the Knicks have done that.
“You hope that at this time we’re the best version of ourselves,” Towns said.
Maybe even the best in the East.