Nearly everything went wrong in Game 2 against the Atlanta Hawks.
From lineups to miscommunications to underperformances, the New York Knicks have a lot to work on as they head to Atlanta tied 1-1.
Lineup woes
After leading by nine after the first quarter, a lineup without Jalen Brunson or Karl-Anthony Towns was brought into the game. Both played a combined 21 minutes in the first quarter.
The lineup included just one starter.
In less than four minutes, the Hawks outscored this lineup 11-3. Mike Brown responded by subbing out OG Anunoby for Josh Hart.
That lineup lasted just 38 seconds before bringing in Jose Alvarado for the first time this series for the next minute and a half.
It wasn’t until 6:30 left in the second quarter that the Knicks had more than one starter on the court. In that span, they scored just 13 points, and the lead was cut to five.
Every lineup but one in the third quarter featured at least two starters — the Knicks outscored the Hawks 30-25. Brunson and Towns shared the floor for almost nine minutes, where they were a +9.
Through the first three quarters, they were a +12.
Despite those results, the fourth quarter opened with no sign of Brunson or Towns. This killed the Knicks’ momentum, and they scored just five points in the first four minutes.
The starters eventually did check in, but uncharacteristically fell apart down the stretch. In the final six minutes of the game, the best closing lineup in the NBA was outscored by seven.
Mike Brown has since doubled down on his decision to keep the costars off, saying that the results late in the regular season carry enough weight.
Spread the wealth
The message all year has been to spread the ball in crunch time, to not put all the weight on Jalen Brunson’s shoulders.
In a game where Brunson already wasn’t shooting his best, there was seemingly no better time to enact that philosophy.
In the clutch, Brunson took five of the Knicks’ seven shot attempts, scoring the only six points in the final four minutes.
Towns, a player who has voiced that he doesn’t actually know his role, did not take a single shot in the clutch and just two in the entire fourth quarter. With his 6-7 third quarter, you’d think he’d be fed the rock, right?
Underperformers
Despite what his numbers say, Towns’ late stretch stood out with his inability to get himself open.
Towns is 7 feet tall and was unable to win a post-up against 6-foot-7 Jonathan Kuminga.
Most of his baskets in that high-scoring third quarter were putbacks, but we cannot act like he was never open.
One of the biggest complaints during Tom Thibodeau’s tenure was the constant hero ball given to the team’s best player, despite the team’s overall performance. Brunson was 8-21 from the field entering the final four minutes and still took 71.4% of the team’s shots in the clutch.
Deuce McBride’s offense has been a glaring issue in the first two games. Currently averaging 3 points on 22.2% from the field, he logged just 13 minutes in Game 2.
Mikal Bridges is averaging 7.5 points on 62.5% from the field in the first quarter of the first two games, but three points on 27.2% in the remaining three.
Despite his hot starts, he’s shot just 11 shots in quarters two through four. Getting the entire team involved throughout the entire 48 minutes is crucial.
Missed Opportunities
Over the last two seasons, the Knicks are now 1-3 when missing 10 or more free throws in a playoff game.
In Game 2, they missed 10 total. Anunoby missed four, Brunson and Hart missed two each.
We’ve seen these missed late-game free throws come back to bite the Knicks before; look back to Game 1 vs. Indiana last year.
Easy opportunities such as those cannot be wasted in games this important.
It’s not the end of the world
The response from many fans after this loss was over-the-top. Acting like this series is over after one game, where they were in the driver’s seat for three straight quarters, is ridiculous.
So many uncharacteristic events had to happen for this collapse to come through. There’s still a lot of ball to be played.
