No Jalen, No Problem
The Knicks - finally - pulled away against the Pacers thanks to a brilliant offensive night without their captain
Good morning! Hey, the Knicks are 20 games over .500. That’s fun.
Knicks 136, Pacers 110
45-25 (W4); 25-9 at home
Don’t let the final score fool you.
If you skipped this one to watch the WBC, you missed a game that was close for about the first 30 minutes. Thanks to the Pacers shooting ( …checks notes… ) 176% from behind the arc during the first half1, the Knicks led by single digits at the midway point and held just a 10-point lead with under three minutes to go in the third.
At the same time, this one was never really in doubt. Even putting aside the Indiana shooting regression we knew was coming, the Pacers never showed an ability to slow down New York’s offense. In that sense, this game offered an interesting contrast to Friday’s matchup, when the Knicks were missing Karl-Anthony Towns and Josh Hart and only managed to score 101 points. Last night, it was Jalen Brunson who sat out, and yet New York had 101 before the fourth quarter began. Even more impressively, they nearly doubled Friday’s assist total, 38 to 20.
Does that mean Jalen Brunson has secretly been holding back their offense this whole time? Ah, no. The Knicks still score 8.3 more points per 100 possessions when he plays, which is among the best in the league. Against the best defenses, his shot creation is still the thing that knocks down the first domino. Without it, things can get ugly fast.
But against a bad Pacers defense2, it was interesting to see a very different version of the offense.
