Knicks 122, Rockets 97: Postgame Reaction
The Knicks took care of business against Houston to start their six-game road swing, beating a team they needed to beat before facing some of the cream of the crop in the West.
One paragraph to describe the game
There was a stretch of all of about four minutes where this game was maybe in doubt, before the Knicks realized that they were a vastly superior team and decided they would beat the crap out of the Rockets. Julius Randle dropped an absolutely effortless 31 points in 30 minutes, RJ Barrett did his thing with 21 points, seven rebounds, and five assists, and Derrick Rose and Immanuel Quickley combined for 37 points off the bench to decimate the Rockets by XX points.
Game ball
Julius Randle: 31 points, 7 rebounds, 6 assists, 13-22 shooting
What more can be said about Randle at this point? Well, in this one, I suppose you could bring up that he was scoring in a staggering variety of ways. It almost seemed like he used the extremely not good Rockets as a testing ground for some stuff that he doesn’t do every day. It also seemed like someone on the Rockets was talking shit in his general direction, because he had some words for the Rockets bench for the whole third quarter, when he dropped 15 points.
Big stat
Derrick Rose and Immanuel Quickley combined for 37 points off the bench. Those two are going to be extremely important players for the Knicks on this road trip, where they’ll be facing some of the best teams the West has to offer, all of which are plenty deep enough to keep up with the Knicks’ bench on its best day. Scoring 37 points (24 for Rose, 13 for Quickley) is a great start to the west coast swing.
Unsung hero
RJ Barrett: 21 points, 7 rebounds, 5 assists, 2 steals, team-high 40 minutes
Other significant performances
Immanuel Quickley: 13 points, 4 assists, 3-5 from three
Derrick Rose: 24 points, 4 assists, 6 rebounds
Reggie Bullock: 11 points, 3-6 from three
