{"id":666491,"date":"2026-05-12T18:01:13","date_gmt":"2026-05-12T18:01:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/666491\/"},"modified":"2026-05-12T18:01:13","modified_gmt":"2026-05-12T18:01:13","slug":"are-the-knicks-a-mirage-a-moment-or-the-real-thing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/666491\/","title":{"rendered":"Are the Knicks a Mirage, a Moment, or the Real Thing?"},"content":{"rendered":"

New York looks like a legit title team. Should we trust our eyes?<\/p>\n

How unbeatable do the New York Knicks look right now? No team in NBA history<\/a> has a better plus-minus through the first 10 games of a playoff run. That\u2019s right. The Knicks are currently plus-194 through two series, which is 24 (!) more points than the previous record holder, the 2016-17 Golden State Warriors.<\/p>\n

New York\u2019s onslaught includes closing out a sweep of the Philadelphia 76ers on Sunday afternoon with a 30-point blowout win. Even more impressive was the epic dismantling in Game 6 against the Atlanta Hawks, during which the Knicks literally built the biggest lead in playoff Translation: We\u2019re dealing with a theoretical peak that\u2019s basketball Elysium. History is being revised in real time. One of the NBA\u2019s more beleaguered franchises is strutting through every possession like a battle-worn behemoth.\u00a0<\/p>\n

With eight wins still standing between these Knicks and basketball immortality, it\u2019s still a wee bit early to plan a parade. We\u2019re not that far removed from New York falling down 2-1 against the very same Hawks they eventually decapitated, with 34-year-old CJ McCollum sashaying around Madison Square Garden<\/a> like it was his own living room. This is the same team that spent much of the season afflicted by melodrama and instability<\/a>, stumbling through stretches when disappointment seemed inevitable. There was infighting, questions about the starting lineup, trade rumors, and inconsistent play.<\/p>\n

Today, all of it feels approximately 600 years ago. Now that they’ve won seven straight games in convincing fashion, the Knicks’ first championship in 53 years has never felt more realistic for a franchise that traditionally makes no room for Pollyannaish prognostication.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Yes, matchups have been kind, and the road is about to get a lot bumpier than it\u2019s been. But I thought Atlanta would beat New York, so it\u2019d be hypocritical for me to downplay the Knicks\u2019 dominance in the first round or to overlook their demolition of a banged-up Sixers team that had come into the second round on an emotional high after shocking the Boston Celtics. But here they are, enjoying some much-needed rest while whoever they play next continues to duke it out.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Also, yes, the Hawks and Sixers don\u2019t employ Cade Cunningham or Donovan Mitchell. They don\u2019t defend like the Detroit Pistons or shoot like the Cleveland Cavaliers, either. Detroit bullied the Knicks into submission in each of their three regular-season and the Cavs easily won the one game they played after the trade deadline. If the Knicks can get past the winner of that series, their likely reward is a showdown against one of two seemingly unbeatable juggernauts, Oklahoma City or San Good luck with that. But all any team can do is control the controllables and do their best to topple whatever stands in their way, with whoever is available.\u00a0<\/p>\n

This is exactly what the Knicks have done, carrying themselves with gladiatorial self-assurance, solving problems, and inflicting misery. Jalen Brunson remains a warm blanket in the fourth quarter and is averaging an extremely efficient 27.9 points per game. When Karl-Anthony Towns isn\u2019t battling foul trouble, he looks like the MVP of these playoffs. Mikal Bridges is impersonating his former self as an on-ball menace who looks comfortable running pick-and-rolls. OG Anunoby decided to make every shot he before he sat the last two games with a hamstring injury.<\/p>\n

Their wins are a holistic head bashing. Play after play, New York\u2019s defensive energy urgently complements waves of offensive talent that has increasingly embraced a more inclusive line of attack. Brunson still dribbles quite a bit, but the Knicks truly coalesce when he\u2019s pinballing through space without the ball. Manifold possibilities at every turn. Much of this is thanks to Towns<\/a>, whose composure as the hub of New York\u2019s offense sits somewhere between revelation and kismet.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

The numbers are silly. He currently leads all players in the postseason in several impact metrics<\/a> with a 74.0 true shooting percentage\u2014coming into this year, the highest PER Towns had ever posted in the postseason was 19.2, and his career average through 50 playoff games was 17.9<\/a>. Right now it\u2019s 30.5, which, um, ranks first. As someone whose big-game bona fides have long been called into question,<\/a> KAT has exonerated himself beautifully. He\u2019s now fully realized as an unstoppable inside-outside threat, spraying in a three-on-one play (he\u2019s shooting 48.3 percent behind the arc) and rumbling his way to the basket on the next (he\u2019s shooting 60.7 percent on drives<\/a>). But what\u2019s even more meaningful, if not transformative, is the unexpected leap he\u2019s fulfilled making plays for everybody else. Towns leads the Knicks with 6.6 assists per game. He’s feeding outside shooters and threading the needle to cutters as they scurry through openings that are created by his own gravitational pull:\u00a0<\/p>\n

His two-man game with Brunson is still potent, but many of Towns\u2019s sweetest passes have come out of New York\u2019s \u201cdelay series,\u201d a ubiquitous five-out alignment that lets him read defensive coverages from the top of the key. With KAT at the helm, it\u2019s a burst of eloquence: flex screens, fake dribble handoffs, and split cuts that have exasperated defenders for weeks. When Towns is off the court, the Knicks\u2019 assist rate plummets to 53.5 percent<\/a>, a mark that would have sat well below last place during the regular season. It\u2019s here where head coach Mike Brown deserves plenty of credit. I was against New York\u2019s decision to fire Tom Thibodeau<\/a>, but having watched its offense evolve from a predictable battering ram into this tableau of read-and-react intricacy\u2014without losing a step on the defensive end\u2014it\u2019s impossible to argue against Brown\u2019s influence in his first year. Win it all or lose in the conference finals, he\u2019s been a necessary breath of fresh air.\u00a0<\/p>\n

All the above doesn\u2019t make the Knicks invincible, but it does alter how they should be perceived. Missteps happen, of course, but those that used to prompt irreversible collapse are now blips on a continuum of organized execution. The mental toughness that carried last year\u2019s team to the precipice of a Finals appearance remains; when combined with a newfound commitment to dominate the court\u2019s most valuable real estate, adversity becomes a flea.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"\"David L. Nemec\/NBAE via Getty Images<\/p>\n

According to CourtSketch<\/a>, the Knicks are averaging 7.035 more points in the paint per 100 possessions in the playoffs than they did during the regular season. It’s the third-largest improvement any team has made in the play-by-play era. They\u2019re also suddenly living at the free throw line, with a playoff-high 6.6 more attempts per 100 possessions. The paint is their domain. The Knicks were already excellent on the defensive glass but have gotten even better in the postseason<\/a>. No team is allowing fewer second-chance points.\u00a0<\/p>\n

New York is one of the more chameleonic teams still standing, too, whether that means going big with Towns and Mitchell Robinson or deploying three-guard lineups featuring any combination of Brunson, Miles McBride, Landry Shamet, Jordan Clarkson, and Jose Alvarado to really open up the floor and up the game\u2019s tempo.\u00a0<\/p>\n

I can\u2019t remember ever feeling less cynical about New York\u2019s chances, but shreds of doubt still exist. The Knicks have enjoyed 3-point luck on both ends that may not be sustainable: In non-garbage-time minutes, opponents have made only 29.8 percent of their non-corner 3s, while the Knicks are way up at 43.3 percent<\/a>. (During the regular season, New York shot 35.5 percent on these attempts while allowing opponents to make 35.9 percent of them.)<\/p>\n

New York\u2019s defense has been surprisingly excellent with Brunson on the court, but when he sits, they hold opponents to 10.2 fewer points per 100 possessions<\/a>. That\u2019s \u2026 a lot. Teams that go out of their way to engage Brunson at the point of attack are still regularly rewarded with a pretty good shot, especially when he switches, demands help, and puts his teammates in rotation:\u00a0<\/p>\n

Regardless of whom the Knicks face in the next round, their opponent will have an elite scorer who knows how to take advantage of a mismatch in isolation. And even when the Knicks do get stops after the opposing offense hunts their point guard down, there\u2019s an accumulative weariness that can settle in for someone who all but has to carry his team\u2019s offense in crunch time. Play after play, game after game, series after series, that amount of attention takes a toll. I\u2019ve always seen this vulnerability as a fatal flaw. So far, though, the Knicks have been able to withstand it just fine.\u00a0<\/p>\n

More broadly speaking, the NBA playoffs are a minefield of sore calves, bruised knees, and sprained ankles. This isn\u2019t exclusive to the Knicks, but Anunoby\u2019s hamstring injury can still undercut all their momentum in the blink of an eye. Robinson\u2019s persistent health issues go without saying, Towns keeps landing awkwardly on his back, and one of Josh Hart\u2019s fingers may or may not fall off within the next few days. None of this is predictable or preventable. Luck is just one of those ingredients every champion needs in its stew.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"\"Getty Images<\/p>\n

Can New York finally have it break its way? Is this finally its year? Strip away the expectations thrust upon it by a reality-agnostic owner, the embarrassing baggage, and Ambien-as-antidote heartbreak it’s wreaked on a fan base going back many generations, and what you have is Leon Rose\u2019s vision come to life. The Knicks have been rewarded for bold swings (the Bridges trade) and shrewd restraint (the decision to spurn Giannis Antetokounmpo).\u00a0<\/p>\n

Led by Brunson, an undersized guard, the Knicks are attempting to defy several historical truisms about roster construction. Champions typically fronted by an MVP who\u2019s taller than Fancy footwork and stoic charisma notwithstanding, if they win it all in this form, it should be celebrated as an anomaly\u2014one of the more memorable title teams we\u2019ll ever see.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Wait, allow me to backtrack from that last sentence. Actually, should we be that surprised? Stick this team behind an X-ray machine, and you\u2019ll see a spine made of steel. A resilient group that\u2019s learning how to harness all five players at the same time, whose baseline disposition is a coiled counterpunch. It\u2019s a team that, critically, won\u2019t beat itself.\u00a0<\/p>\n

For years, self-sabotage felt inevitable. The Knicks were, if not cursed, cosmically doomed. But right now, all that defeatism has been replaced by anticipation. New York is eliciting hope and, dare I say, catharsis! With the conference finals on the horizon, playing their best basketball in the middle of May, there\u2019s no better place any contender should want to be.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Michael Pina<\/p>\n

<\/a>Michael Pina is a senior staff writer at The Ringer who covers the NBA.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"New York looks like a legit title team. Should we trust our eyes? How unbeatable do the New…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":666492,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[574],"tags":[64,63,726,85],"class_list":["post-666491","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-basketball","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-basketball","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/666491","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=666491"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/666491\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/666492"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=666491"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=666491"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=666491"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}