The New York Knicks defeat the Atlanta Hawks, 113-102, to take a 1-0 series lead. Jalen Brunson leads the Knicks with 28 points.
NEW YORK – For a brief moment, Game 1 the first-round series between the New York Knicks and Atlanta Hawks felt a little like the last Game 1 in this building, when the Indiana Pacers came back from 17 points down with a little more than six minutes left in regulation to stun the Knicks in overtime.
This time, the Knicks’ lead was bigger (19), there was less time (less than four minutes) left, and the Hawks’ ran out of magic after a 10-0 run that cut their deficit to single digits. The Knicks got the one stop they didn’t get in last year’s conference finals and held on for a 113-102 victory at Madison Square Garden on Saturday.
Jalen Brunson (28 points and seven assists) and Karl-Anthony Towns (25 points, eight rebounds and three blocks) led the way for the Knicks. The difference in the final score was at the free throw line, where the New York outscored Atlanta, 25-12.
Here are some notes, quotes, numbers and film from a somewhat comfortable Knicks win:
1. Depth favors the Knicks
For the second straight year, the Knicks’ starting lineup was solid, but not great, outscoring opponents by just 2.3 points per 100 possessions in its 541 regular-season minutes. But New York had the league’s third-ranked bench. And bench minutes were critical on Saturday.
The Hawks led by one late in the first quarter, but the Knicks took control with a 13-1 run spanning the first and second, capped by an end-to-end sequence where a Mitchell Robinson block led to a Jordan Clarkson tip dunk. The Hawks would never lead after that.
The Hawks tried to take advantage of Clarkson’s defense as soon as he stepped onto the floor, but that strategy didn’t bear much fruit. Instead, he gave the Knicks some punch offensively, scoring eight points in less than 12 minutes.
Robinson didn’t grab a single offensive rebound on Saturday, but the Hawks remembered how important he was in the Knicks’ win in Atlanta two weeks earlier, and after an effective first-half stint, they strategized to get him off the floor as soon as he checked back in midway through the third quarter. They intentionally fouled him on two straight possessions and, after he went 1-for-4 on the free throws, Knicks coach Mike Brown was forced to take him out of the game.
That altered the Knicks’ rotation, and it had both Brunson and Towns off the floor at the start of the fourth. But the Hawks couldn’t take advantage, scoring just two points on their first four possessions of the final period. On the other end of the floor, Clarkson and Robinson hooked up for a pick-and-roll lob and Miles McBride drained a transition 3 to put the Knicks up 12.
Because their bench held it down, the Knicks’ stars didn’t have to play huge minutes; Brunson played a little more than 36, while Towns played less than 33.
The Hawks’ bench couldn’t keep up. Gabe Vincent and Jonathan Kuminga didn’t provide enough offensively to make up for their lack of resistance on the other end. Zaccharie Risacher had a rough three minutes in the first half and didn’t play after that. And Mouhamed Gueye doesn’t have the size to hang with Robinson and Towns inside.
2. Knicks look like a top-10 defense
The Knicks were one of six teams that ranked in the top 10 on both ends of the floor this season, with their defensive success being a little bit of a surprise, given the issues that Brunson and Towns have had on that end of the floor over the years. They actually ranked fourth defensively (only the Thunder, Celtics and Spurs allowed fewer points per 100 possessions) over the last 11 weeks.
While they never trailed after the first quarter, the Knicks really took control in the third, when they held Atlanta to just 19 points on 24 possessions. The Hawks shot 8-for-23, while committing five turnovers in the period. There were some rough moments from Dyson Daniels, but the Knicks were also able to deny Atlanta’s primary ball-handlers on the perimeter while still collapsing in the paint:
The Hawks had one sequence in the third quarter where the ball and bodies were moving, but even then, the Knicks were able to clog the paint and force a tough shot:
“The formula for us and our identity has been to run and move the ball,” Hawks coach Quin Snyder said afterward. “It’s not like we didn’t do that, but we need to do more of it.
“When we can’t get to the rim, [we need to] get out and get more 3s.”
Atlanta was a solid 14-for-37 (38%) from 3-point range in Game 1, but shot below 50% (21-for-43) in the paint for just the 15th time this season. The last two occasions have come against the Knicks, who are responsible for three of the Hawks’ 12 worst shot-quality scores of the season, according to tracking data.
3. Getting Daniels off of Brunson
Daniels was first-team All-Defense last year and is a candidate for the same honor this year. Not surprisingly, he was the primary defender on Brunson. But only two of Brunson’s 22 field goal attempts came with Daniels on him.
It’s one thing to start a possession guarding the other team’s star. It’s another to stay there throughout the entire trip down the floor. And the Knicks did a good job on Saturday of getting Daniels off of Brunson, who was more comfortable attacking other Atlanta defenders.
Brunson did some of the work himself, making a little like Stephen Curry, moving without the ball and using bodies to free himself:
A Josh Hart back-screen got a switch onto CJ McCollum:
It wasn’t Brunson’s most efficient scoring night (28 points, 9-for-22 from the field, 7-for-8 from the line), but the Hawks would probably like to do a better job of keeping their best defender attached to him going forward.
4. Make him work on defense
The Hawks may also want to attack Brunson a little more on the other end of the floor. Over their four games against the Knicks, the guy that Brunson was defending has set just 20 total screens for Jalen Johnson.
The seven screens that Brunson’s man set for Johnson on Saturday was the most in those four games, but probably not enough. Two of those came in the last 2 1/2 minutes of the fourth quarter, after the game was essentially over.
Johnson isn’t the off-the-dribble shooter that other stars are, so Hart was smart to go under the first of those screens and get back in front of his man:
But the Hawks made no second-efforts with that action, coming back with another screen and forcing Hart to work more. They had some possessions that weren’t purposeful enough.
They’ll need to be better offensively in Game 2 on Monday (8 ET, NBC/Peacock) or they’ll be facing an 0-2 deficit.
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John Schuhmann has covered the NBA for more than 20 years. You can e-mail him here, find his archive here and follow him on Bluesky.
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