DETROIT — This is where you learn a lot about the makeup of a team: when the stakes are highest, when backs are against the wall, when elimination is on the table for a team destined for far more than a fleeting first-round appearance.
The Knicks couldn’t have afforded to lose Game 3 at Little Caesar’s Arena on Thursday. Not after dropping Game 2 on their own home court. Not against a Pistons team that beat them three times out of four during the regular season. Not as the No. 3 seed with a clear advantage in both talent on paper and playoff experience.
But these are the playoffs, and styles make fights — and for a Knicks team with two All-Star starters plus two premier three-and-D wings, the battle was always going to be in-between the lines.
The Knicks walked into the belly of the beat, in front of a hostile Little Caesar’s Arena crowd representing a city that hadn’t seen a playoff victory at home since the Pistons played basketball at The Palace at Auburn Hills.
They emerged victorious, 118-116, to right their Game 2 wrongs and take a 2-1 first-round series lead over the Pistons on Thursday. The two teams will meet again for Game 4 on Saturday.
And as for the lessons? The biggest takeaway from New York’s gutsy performance in the midwest?
These Knicks have heart. They needed a lot of it to get through the Pistons on Thursday.
There was fog. There were flames. There was a pregame performance by Detroit’s own star rapper, Tee Grizzley.
There were “f*** you” chants directed towards Jalen Brunson, plus boos every time he touched the basketball. There was a scuffle between Karl-Anthony Towns, Mitchell Robinson and Paul Reed. If any of it flustered the Knicks, it was hard to tell.
This is playoff basketball, after all, and series are decided in seven games, not three.
The Knicks weren’t going to stay predictable. Not when your opponent is spending its each and every waking moment scouring film for even the slightest advantage. And not after the Pistons stole Game 2 of their first-round series at Madison Square Garden, in large part due to New York’s own offensive inefficiency.
This time, the Knicks flipped the script. Jalen Brunson, who took 27 shots in both Games 1 and 2 and ranked at or near the top in of the league in playoff time of possession metrics (dribbles, touches and time holding the ball), stayed true to his word of getting off the ball in Game 3.
Instead, Towns, who took just three shots in the second half of Game 2 and no shots at all in the fourth quarter, took four shots in the opening minutes of Game 3 on Thursday. Towns finished with a game-high 31 points on 10-of-18 shooting from the field.
Good things happen when the KAT gets to attack.
“When he gets the ball in the paint, there’s two and three guys coming at him. I don’t want him forcing bad shots that doesn’t make sense,” Thibodeau said on Thursday. “Hit the open man, trust the pass and then you’ve got to keep it moving. We can do some things better to search him out, get him that second look. But don’t fight the game. The same with Jalen if he’s being blitzed. Trust the pass.”
OG Anunoby took seven more shots in Game 3 than he did in Game 2. Brunson shot 9-of-20 from the field for 29 points in Game 3 but his willingness to let his teammates make plays turned the game in New York’s favor.
“He’s that good, and he’s the type of guy that can beat you different ways,” Pistons head coach J.B. Bickerstaff said ahead of tipoff on Thursday. “Obviously you know he’s bringing the ball up the floor but they’ve got weapons all over the floor. So you can’t just say OK we’re gonna worry about him and expect Towns and Bridges and Anunoby and hart to not make plays. This is a 5-on-5 game, and he’s dynamic enough that if you over-help, he can pass the ball,. If you don’t help enough, he can find his own shot. So you’ve gotta do the job as a five-man unit, and that’s gotta be the focus regardless of the personnel.”
The Knicks finally found the right balance of Brunson making plays for himself and relying on his teammates — the same teammates who kept New York afloat while the captain was out with a right ankle sprain.
And yet still, Game 3 came down to the final seconds, though the Pistons were the beneficiary of a bonus timeout: They had zero when Brunson missed a free throw with 0.5 seconds left on the clock, but the buzzer sounded before anyone touched the ball, and officials ruled it Pistons ball side out of bounds, even though they would have never been able to stop the clock off the shot.
Ball don’t lie: Tim Hardaway Jr., who had a lights-out shooting night from downtown, threw the ball out of bounds on a Hail Mary attempt. Knicks win. But it was close.
Hardaway shot 7-of-12 from downtown for 24 points. Pistons All-Star Cade Cunningham, too, had 24 points and 11 assists but on 10-of-25 shooting from the field.
The Knicks made their adjustments. The Pistons will, too. But the Knicks proved they have heart, the heart to walk into hostile territory, match the Pistons’ physicality and silence a deafening Detroit crowd.
For a team already owning a talent and experience advantage, that is the series.
