their 124-113 win over the Spurs<\/a> on Tuesday night at T-Mobile Arena.<\/p>\n\u201cHe played big time,\u201d Jalen Brunson said. \u201cI\u2019m very happy for him. Maybe a surprise to a bunch of people, but none of you see how hard this kid works. Just very happy for him and the way he played tonight. Helped us, for sure \u2014 we needed him. He works so hard, I\u2019m very happy for him. This is big time for him.\u201d<\/p>\n
Having trailed most of the game, the Knicks outscored the Spurs by 16 points in the fourth quarter, and Kolek played almost the entirety of it. <\/p>\n
It was him, not Mikal Bridges, who coach Mike Brown had on the floor down the stretch. He finished with 14 points, five assists and five rebounds and was plus-14.<\/p>\n
Spurs defenders were pressuring ball-handlers \u2014 particularly Brunson \u2014 aggressively all night. Brown\u2019s decision to play Kolek alongside him to have another ball-handler off the floor and take pressure off Brunson worked like a charm.<\/p>\n
Tuesday\u2019s showing followed a breakout effort in the semis on Saturday against the Magic, when he similarly played significant fourth-quarter minutes.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf you\u2019re a rookie, if you\u2019re a young guy, if you appreciate the game, you should be looking at what he\u2019s doing and how he\u2019s finding his ability to get on the court and stay on the court,\u201d Josh Hart said. \u201cAnd you should model yourself off of that.\u201d<\/p>\n
Kolek was set to earn roughly $2 million this year. The prize money for winning the Cup is $530,933 per player.<\/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
As Hart scored the final basket of the game, he looked over at Kolek and flashed a money sign with his hands.<\/p>\n
It was fitting, because in Vegas, he became Kasino Kolek.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"LAS VEGAS \u2014 Unlike so many who visit Sin City, Tyler Kolek left this city in a much…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":73124,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[21,9,11,1104,10,319],"class_list":{"0":"post-73123","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-york","8":"tag-nba","9":"tag-new-york","10":"tag-new-york-headlines","11":"tag-new-york-knicks","12":"tag-new-york-news","13":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73123","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=73123"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73123\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/73124"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=73123"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=73123"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=73123"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
![\"A](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/Tyler-Kolek-1.jpg\")
A jubilant Tyler Kolek (left) congratulates Jordan Clarkson for hitting a key 3-pointer in the fourth quarter of the Knicks\u2019 124-113 NBA Cup tourney-clinching win over the Spurs in Las Vegas on Dec. 16, 2025. Charles Wenzelberg \/ New York Post<\/p>\n