{"id":38079,"date":"2025-11-13T09:33:11","date_gmt":"2025-11-13T09:33:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/38079\/"},"modified":"2025-11-13T09:33:11","modified_gmt":"2025-11-13T09:33:11","slug":"knicks-mike-brown-benches-mikal-bridges-josh-hart-in-fourth-quarter","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/38079\/","title":{"rendered":"Knicks’ Mike Brown benches Mikal Bridges, Josh Hart in fourth quarter"},"content":{"rendered":"

Mikal Bridges and Josh Hart, two core Knicks, were benched for at least most of the fourth quarter in Wednesday\u2019s 124-107 loss to the Magic<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Hart didn\u2019t play at all in the final period, the second game in a row he collected zero minutes in the fourth quarter. Bridges logged just one minute in the fourth quarter, and couldn\u2019t explain the reason.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m not sure,\u201d said Bridges, who scored a season-low six points on 3 of 9 shooting.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"NewJosh Hart and Franz Wagner chase a loose ball during the second half of the Knicks\u2019 124-107 blowout loss to the Magic at the Garden on Nov. 12, 2025. JASON SZENES FOR NY POST<\/p>\n

Hart, who had been playing better after a bumpy start to the season, appeared frustrated after the game. <\/p>\n

Landry Shamet, Miles McBride and Jordan Clarkson all played more minutes in the fourth quarter Wednesday than either Hart or Bridges.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cI got my own stuff,\u201d Hart, who scored 10 points in 18 minutes with three turnovers, said when asked about the apparent injury to teammate Jalen Brunson.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Regardless of the minutes distribution, there will be big alterations if Brunson is hurt. The point guard turned his right ankle in garbage time, a development that leaves coach Mike Brown under the microscope for playing his star when the game\u2019s outcome was settled.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Before tip-off, Brown said he\u2019d grown more comfortable with his rotation.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cI was all over the map [with my rotations earlier in the season]. Because I was all over the map, the players were all over the map,\u201d Brown said. \u201cAnd after getting some practices in, getting some games under our belt, showing the guys, \u2018Hey this is what we should be looking at, we have a little bit of a rhythm.\u2019 \u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"NewMikal Bridges goes up for a layup during the second half of the Knicks\u2019 blowout loss to the Magic. JASON SZENES FOR NY POST<\/p>\n

The rhythm stopped along with the Knicks\u2019 five-game winning streak, as Brown\u2019s squad was outmuscled by the physical Magic. <\/p>\n

Brown altered his rotation \u2014 particularly by benching Bridges \u2014 and he\u2019ll have to change it further if Brunson is out.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Mitchell Robinson returned from a one-game absence because of load management but wasn\u2019t a positive factor in a game dominated by Orlando\u2019s size and power.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\tWhat\u2019s happening on and off the Garden court\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\tSign up for Inside the Knicks by Stefan Bondy, a weekly exclusive on Sports+.\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\tThank you\n\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

He still collected five offensive rebounds but the Knicks were outscored by 11 points in Robinson\u2019s 17 minutes.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Robinson is still playing in three-minute bursts as part of his load management plan. He also won\u2019t play in both games of a back-to-back set.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The Knicks next play a home-and-away set against the Heat \u2014 starting Friday at MSG. Miami beat New York earlier this season.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t think we responded properly [to Orlando\u2019s physicality],\u201d Hart said. \u201cSo, learned a lesson. We have a tough, physical opponent on Friday. And we got to respond.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Mikal Bridges and Josh Hart, two core Knicks, were benched for at least most of the fourth quarter…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":38080,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[4778,14063,21,9,11,1104,10,1264,319],"class_list":{"0":"post-38079","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-york","8":"tag-josh-hart","9":"tag-mikal-bridges","10":"tag-nba","11":"tag-new-york","12":"tag-new-york-headlines","13":"tag-new-york-knicks","14":"tag-new-york-news","15":"tag-orlando-magic","16":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38079","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=38079"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38079\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/38080"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=38079"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=38079"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=38079"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}