Jalen Brunson finished with 38 points as New York rallied from a 22-point deficit.
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NEW YORK — Let’s face it, wild and crazy as it was, Tuesday night really started on Monday night for thousands of customers inside Madison Square Garden. NBA stars from other places have long described New Yorkers as educated basketball fans, sometimes to excess, but this much was clear:
The Garden crowd for Game 1 of the Eastern Conference finals was smart enough to understand exactly what it saw in Game 1 of the Western Conference finals. The moment San Antonio Spurs wonderkind Victor Wembanyama pulled up from 28 feet against the Oklahoma City Thunder late in his own masterpiece theater, looking as comfortable as Steph Curry from the same range, everything changed, dramatically, in the world of basketball.
Knicks fans had the same reaction as Thunder fans. How are we going to beat that?
How is anyone going to beat that?
Maybe the Thunder will figure out a way — they are the defending champs for a reason, and they do suit up their own all-time great in two-time MVP Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, whom the Knicks could have drafted instead of Kevin Knox (different regime, different regret, different story for a different night). Either way, Game 1 out West was contested at such an absurdly high level that the loyalists who filled the Garden for Game 1 back East had to be wondering if the Knicks really had it in them to beat whichever titan emerges on the other side of the NBA Finals draw.
And then the closing seven and a half minutes of the fourth quarter happened. Jalen Brunson happened. As if to answer the surreal events in Oklahoma City, where it sure seemed that a 22-year-old giant had executed a hostile takeover of the sport, the Knicks erased a 22-point deficit and beat the Cleveland Cavaliers in overtime 115-104.
So much had to go right for the home team and wrong for the Cavs that it was as improbable a postseason result as any witness could fathom. Blowing a 22-point lead in half a quarter, with so much at stake, just is not possible. No way. No how.
But Brunson, who finished with 38 points, kept blowing past James Harden and making shots, and Cleveland coach Kenny Atkinson kept refusing to call a timeout. Inside the final minute of regulation, Landry Shamet made a 3-pointer to tie that bounced above and around the rim enough to summon the ghost of Tyrese Haliburton’s Game 1 Hail Mary last year, when the Garden wasn’t nearly as thrilled with the result.
Sam Merrill barely missed a winning 3-pointer in the final seconds, and that was that for the Cavs. Everyone knew who would prevail in overtime. Everyone knew the Knicks were extending their postseason winning streak to eight, and doing so in a way that added to their case as a championship team in the making.
The Knicks won seven straight against the Atlanta Hawks and Philadelphia 76ers — by a combined 185 points — with far superior talent that was unlocked by Mike Brown’s decision to convert Karl-Anthony Towns into a passing quarterback. They were a machine.
Well oiled.
They sat for eight days, waiting on Cleveland to finish off the Detroit Pistons in a Sunday night Game 7 and hoping their rust would still represent a favorable matchup for the Cavs’ fatigue. But for the first three and a half quarters of Game 1, fatigue was beating the hell out of rust. Donovan Mitchell, a local, was taking a big Spida bite out of the Big Apple.
And this is where the Knicks’ decision to hire a seen-it-all veteran like Brown paid off again. Actually, Brown had never seen this in a playoff game. But he wasn’t willing to put an artificial ceiling on his dreams. He kept his starters out there knowing that a couple of 3-pointers and a couple of defensive stops would get the crowd going and, perhaps, ignite something magical.
The man had a plan, too, a damn good one.
“It was no secret we were attacking Harden,” Brown said.
Attacking him with a superstar who, in his own way, is almost as unique as Wemby.
“Obviously, we don’t get it done if Jalen Brunson doesn’t play like one of the MVP guys in the league,” Brown said. “He was phenomenal.”
So was the Garden crowd. On at least a dozen late possessions, it felt like the building might come tumbling down. The fans stayed with the game, at full force, because they saw the Knicks doing the same thing.
“Definitely thankful,” Brunson said, “because they could have walked out if they wanted to.”
Said Towns: “This team, all we want to do is make this city proud, and bring this city wins. And to be able to accomplish that tonight, on a night where it didn’t seem like it was going to happen, it’s an honor and it’s truly something special.”
The Knicks eventually survived their extended All-Star break between the Philly and Cleveland series, as well as OG Anunoby’s re-entry into the starting lineup, with a 30-8 run to force overtime. They needed huge shots and relentless two-way play from Shamet and Mikal Bridges. They needed the kind of defense that held the Cavs to 21 combined points in the fourth quarter and overtime.
The Knicks got some help from Atkinson, too, who called only one timeout as his team came completely undone. “I like to hold my timeouts,” he explained. The Knicks were more than happy that he did.
But on the coaching front, Brown had a much bigger impact on the final score. He told a story about his time as a Golden State Warriors assistant, counting Harden’s dribbles when the guard was with Houston. Brown would tell the Warriors, “He’s dribbling almost a thousand times a game,” so they would feel more confident in picking up Harden full-court in an attempt to wear him down.
This time around, Brown reminded his Knicks that Harden and Mitchell had played a lot more basketball than they had, and might wilt down the stretch. “You say stuff like that to help give your guys a psychological advantage,” Brown said.
Sure enough, Cleveland broke down both psychologically and physically when it mattered most. The Knicks pulled off a miracle and gave their fans renewed hope that they can beat anyone, at any time, on any stage, under any circumstances.
Yes, including Wemby’s Spurs and SGA’s Thunder.
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Ian O’Connor Ian O’Connor is a columnist for The Athletic. He is the author of six straight New York Times bestsellers. O’Connor was a columnist at various major outlets who earned multiple first-place finishes in contests run by the Society of Professional Journalists, Associated Press Sports Editors, Pro Football Writers of America, and Golf Writers Association of America. He is a proud former copy boy at The New York Times. Follow Ian on X @Ian_OConnor.
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