Party Poopers
The Knicks can't end 2025 with a bang, but there's still much to look forward to in 2026
Good morning, and apologies for the later than normal newsletter. I decided to be a dad as we rung in the new year at the Macri household. I hope everyone had fun celebrating, even if the Knicks didn’t do us any favors.
Spurs 134, Knicks 132
23-10 Overall (L1); 8-8 on the road
Well that wasn’t the way we wanted to ring in the new year.
If you’d told me before the game that the Knicks would show up in San Antonio, put up 132 points on a night when none of the starters played particularly well, sustained a one-man wrecking crew performance from Wemby, and lost because a Spurs role player from Staten Freakin’ Island went nuclear, I’d have found myself hard pressed to be too upset.
But there’s a reason that a book called “The Logic of Fandom” would just be a bunch of empty pages.
This was a highly annoying loss to end the year on for three reasons:
Wembanyama left with a knee injury with 10:32 remaining, and the Knicks had actually done well to that point sustaining the outsized impact of his oversized frame.
With all due respect to Julian Champagnie and his franchise record 11 3-pointers, it wasn’t like this was Steph Curry bending a defense in knots, where none of their heroic efforts could limit the eruption. Many of Champagnie’s shots were open, or at least more open than they should have been. Worse yet, all four of his fourth quarter threes came after Wemby left the game, theoretically making San Antonio far more manageable to guard. As the most threatening outside shooter the Spurs had, shutting him down should have been the top priority, not an afterthought.
They led this thing by 11 points with eight minutes to go and proceeded to give up 35 points in the final 7:52 of play. Yuck.
Put all that together, and yeah, this loss was far more frustrating than it had any right to be.
No contender is perfect, and when that glaring imperfection comes back to bite you in the ass, it stings. Even amidst the great vibes emanating from a team that is still an NBA-best 14-4 since November 24 (15-4 if you count the Cup win), it’s hard to overlook that fly in the soup. Since the Cup semifinal on December 13, the Knicks have the 26th ranked defense in the league.
It wouldn’t be unfair to say they have been making just enough plays on D to win games with their otherworldly offense, but last night in the fourth quarter, Jalen Brunson, Mikal Bridges and OG Anunoby combined to go 1-for-8 from deep - all on good to great looks - during the relevant portion of the game1.
Cold shooting happens. It shouldn’t be the death knell that it was here.
