The Knicks had to have Friday’s matchup against the Milwaukee Bucks. It was the team’s last opportunity to pick up an easy win for two weeks.
The Knicks defeated the Bucks without Giannis Antetokounmpo (calf) in a resounding 127-98 victory to finish their three-game road trip with a 2-1 record. They now move on to a five-game slate of contenders from both conferences, beginning with a matinee meeting with Victor Wembanyama and the Western Conference’s No. 2-seeded San Antonio Spurs on Sunday.
The Knicks will face the Spurs (43-16), travel to Toronto to visit the Raptors (34-25), then return to Madison Square Garden to host the NBA’s No. 1-seeded Oklahoma City Thunder (46-15). They will then kickoff a five-game road trip with stops in Denver (37-23), Los Angeles against both the Lakers (34-24) and Clippers (27-31), Utah (18-41) and Indiana (15-45) before hosting the Golden State Warriors back home on March 15.
After the Spurs game, six of the Knicks’ following seven games will be on the road. The stretch also includes two sets of back-to-backs, first in Toronto on Tuesday before hosting OKC on Wednesday, and next, in Los Angeles, seeing Luka Doncic and Kawhi Leonard on consecutive nights.
Head coach Mike Brown insists he doesn’t look beyond the next game on the schedule.
“You know the schedule better than me. I know we’re going to Toronto some time soon,” he told reporters in Milwaukee after Friday’s win. “That’s too many games for me to think about. I just take them one game at a time. I know we’ve got San Antonio at [1 p.m.] on Sunday and just trying to figure out how we’re gonna prepare for them.”
The first five of those opponents could be the Knicks’ toughest test of the season.
The Spurs, Raptors, Thunder, Nuggets and Lakers combine for a 194-103 record, and the Knicks are 2-5 on the season against teams with a .653 winning percentage or better. They are 5-2 against teams with a record above .600 but lower than .653, and are 3-0 against the only top-five seed from either conference with a lower winning percentage than .600: the Raptors.
In the East, the Knicks went 0-3 against the Detroit Pistons, own a 2-1 record over the Boston Celtics and are 2-1 against the Cavaliers. In a season riddled with championship expectations, inconsistency has plagued a team that has gone stretches without playing competitive basketball, only to remind teams why they are title contenders via 77-point halves like the one they hung on the Bucks on Friday.
The Knicks lost to the Cavaliers by 15 before their bounce-back win in Milwaukee.
“It’s important to battle through adversity. In a playoff setting, you may lose one, you’ve got to bounce back and get the next one, and we’ve done a good job of showing we can bounce back quick,” said Karl-Anthony Towns. “It’s a good sign for us but consistency is everything. As long as we can keep building off this momentum and keep building off this mindset, we can be the best team we can be come April.”
ROOKIE RUNS WILD
Brown suggested fourth-year forward Jeremy Sochan could get a longer look at minutes over rookie Mohamed Diawara given Sochan’s experience, size and strength on a Knicks team competing for a title. But on Friday, the Knicks coach let his rookie run wild, and Diawara rewarded the confidence with 10 points on 2-of-3 shooting from 3-point range in 23 minutes off the bench.
“Those guys are the ninth and 10th guys [in the rotation], and I’ll make the call as I go along,” said Brown, “but everybody has to make sure they keep themselves ready.”
Sochan logged six minutes on Friday.
THE SCREEN GAME
Jalen Brunson scored 27 points but 22 of them came in an electrifying opening quarter. Brown said Friday was the best screen-setting game he’s seen from his team this season.
“Jalen did a great job, our whole team did, and Jalen is one of those guys — but the floor has to be spaced the right way,” he said. “Our physicality offensively was there because we set screens the right way, and then we played fast.
“So it takes all of us to do that, and when you do it–and when you have one of those guys–he’s gonna be able to break loose and that was good to see tonight.”
