NEW YORK (AP) \u2014 Mike Brown had a welcome to Madison Square Garden moment Wednesday night, courtesy of a fan\u2026<\/p>\n
NEW YORK (AP) \u2014 Mike Brown had a welcome to Madison Square Garden moment Wednesday night, courtesy of a fan dressed in an orange-and-blue suit<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u201cSpike Lee came over and gave me a hug before the game,\u201d Brown said. \u201cI\u2019m like, \u2018Spike, do you know who I am?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n Brown is the guy the New York Knicks are counting on to take them across the finish line after Tom Thibodeau got them all the way there. So of course Lee, one of the Knicks\u2019 most famous fans, and just about everyone else in the building knew the coach.<\/p>\n And they had to be happy with what they saw after the Knicks opened the season with a 119-111 victory over the Cleveland Cavaliers<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u201cGood first win knowing that we\u2019ve got a lot of room to grow,\u201d Brown said.<\/p>\n The Knicks reached the Eastern Conference finals last season for the first time since 2000, then made a surprising coaching change when they fired Thibodeau, who led them to the postseason in four of his five seasons.<\/p>\n Brown was hired to take over a team that is one of the favorites to win the conference \u2014 and make a veteran squad with most of the same players look different. The Knicks sure did in the first half when Brown used 11 players, a large rotation that was rarely seen under Thibodeau.<\/p>\n \u201cI truly believe this team is a deep team,\u201d said Brown, who like Thibodeau is a two-time NBA Coach of the Year. He said his mother and sister traveled from Texas to attend his first home game in New York.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s my job to keep trying to find combinations out on the floor that work, and just like they\u2019ve got a lot of room to grow, I\u2019ve got a lot of room to grow, too, because I\u2019m still learning. And the neat part about it is, there are a lot of different ways I can go with it and if I can learn on the fly, because we have guys that can play.\u201d<\/p>\n Brown will have to wait to unveil his preferred starting lineup, because both Mitchell Robinson (left ankle injury management) and Josh Hart (lower back spasms) were sidelined. One of them figures to be a starter when available.<\/p>\n Instead, Brown went with Ariel Hukporti, a seldom-used center last season, as a starter. And he seemed willing to try numerous units, at one point sending out a lineup where no player was taller than 6-foot-7 OG Anunoby.<\/p>\n