WFAN interview Monday<\/a>, when the owner set the bar at Finals or failure. <\/p>\nHe rarely attends road games, and it\u2019s unclear why Dolan showed up in Phoenix, but it\u2019s worth noting that his entertainment venue \u2014 The Sphere \u2014 is close by in Vegas.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cWe want to get to the Finals. And we should win the Finals,\u201d Dolan said this week. \u201cThis is sports and anything can happen. But getting to the Finals, we absolutely got to do.\u201d<\/p>\n
They haven\u2019t looked the part lately. And certainly not in Phoenix. Leading by two with 4:11 remaining, the Knicks went about four minutes with just two points. <\/p>\n
Overall, they shot 32 percent with six turnovers in the fourth quarter.\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
OG Anunoby ensured defeat by missing two of three free throws with 2.2 seconds left.<\/p>\n
The end of the fourth was one turning point, and the most important.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Another was midway through the third quarter, and with the Suns up by four, Dillon Brooks, who was running amok on New York\u2019s defense, exploded toward the rim with a drive and jump.\u00a0<\/p>\n
New York Knicks center Karl-Anthony Towns (32) reacts against the Phoenix Suns in the first half at Mortgage Matchup Center. Mark J. Rebilas-Imagn Images<\/p>\n
Brunson stepped up. Drew the charge.\u00a0<\/p>\n
On the next possession, Brooks, a tall and tormenting defender, glued himself to Brunson, and it didn\u2019t matter. Brunson crossed up Brooks, stepped back and buried a trey.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Twenty seconds later, Brunson hit two free throws, then another 3-pointer. Suddenly, the Knicks \u2014 who trailed by as many as 11 in the opening quarter \u2014 were up, 80-78.\u00a0<\/p>\n
It looked good for the visitors. Then it didn\u2019t.<\/p>\n
The Suns immediately responded with a 14-0 run, a stretch defined by New York turnovers and softness. The Suns turned up the physicality and the Knicks looked to the refs for help that never arrived.\u00a0<\/p>\n
So they entered the fourth quarter with an eight-point deficit, and they couldn\u2019t summon another clutch victory.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The Suns (23-15) were supposed to dissolve into a rebuild after trading Kevin Durant, but they\u2019ve been much better than anticipated behind inspired play from newcomer Dillon Brooks and restored excellence from Devin Booker.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Phoenix Suns guard Devin Booker (1) drives to the basket against New York Knicks guard Mikal Bridges (25) in the first half at Mortgage Matchup Center. Mark J. Rebilas-Imagn Images<\/p>\n
The fiery guard, acquired from Houston for Durant, has been a revelation offensively this season and dropped 20 of his 27 points Monday in the first half. Booker added 31 points and eight assists.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey\u2019ve been playing good basketball,\u201d Knicks coach Mike Brown. \u201cThey have some veteran guys that have been through the fire, you have a guy in Dillon Brooks who has shown that he can obviously defend and bring an edge to this basketball team and get it done on the offensive end of the floor.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cBook is an All-Star obviously player. They get out and run, crash the glass. They do a pretty good job defensively overall, trying to put pressure on you. They\u2019ll pick up full court. There are a lot of things we\u2019re going to have to make sure we maintain or follow our principles on tonight. They can attack in a lot of different ways.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Knicks, meanwhile, were regrouping. Brown held a practice Tuesday in their facility \u2014 their first practice at home in weeks \u2014 and tweaked his schemes.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ve got to keep trying to find ways to help them. So on both ends of the floor I\u2019ve got to continue to do that even now. That\u2019s what my job is,\u201d Brown said. \u201cWe made some changes on both sides of the ball. We\u2019ll see how effective it is and see if it can help us combat that \u2014 quote unquote \u2014 problems that we may be having technically at times on both sides of the ball.\u201d<\/p>\n
It didn\u2019t help Friday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"PHOENIX \u2014\u00a0 Jalen Brunson couldn\u2019t save the reeling Knicks.\u00a0 In fact, Captain Clutch faltered when it mattered most.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":95617,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[4777,44600,1555,21,9,11,1104,10,4575,319],"class_list":{"0":"post-95616","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-york","8":"tag-jalen-brunson","9":"tag-james-dolan","10":"tag-karl-anthony-towns","11":"tag-nba","12":"tag-new-york","13":"tag-new-york-headlines","14":"tag-new-york-knicks","15":"tag-new-york-news","16":"tag-phoenix-suns","17":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/95616","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=95616"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/95616\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/95617"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=95616"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=95616"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=95616"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}