Knicks 109, Pistons 90: Movin’ on up
The Knicks got above .500 at the latest point in the season since 2013. By game’s end, they were playing like the fourth seed that they would be after their record settled at 18-17. With each passing game, they play that part even more convincingly.
One lesson I pro’ly spent too much time on with my students was their closing paragraphs. I especially had an allergic reaction to anyone who began an essay’s concluding paragraph with “In conclusion.” The reader knows it’s the conclusion! They’ve been anticipating it — nobody sits to read something they think is never-ending. Instead of announcing your conclusion and using it to repeat what you just spent the whole paper saying, think of it as a mountaintop. You’ve led your audience on this journey up a mountain. The conclusion is when they reach the pinnacle. Close by giving them a new vantage. A new horizon.
The 2021 New York Knicks continue to brighten and broaden horizons. Now a winning team after Sunday’s 109-90 win in Detroit, they’re one of only four teams in the East who can make that claim (though a half-dozen are right on the verge). These Knicks do not appear to resemble the midseason mirages of recent times, teams featuring Arron Afflalo and Jose Calderon as key players. These Knicks have won seven of nine featuring a rotation whose only thirty-somethings are midseason additions Derrick Rose and Taj Gibson. This team is young and they defend and they’re winning and they’re getting better. A lot of years, the Knicks looked like these Pistons. Now they look like the Knicks. The Good Knicks.
Derrick Rose, who has been a massive upgrade vs. what Dennis Smith Jr. looked able to provide, bested DSJ all night, from the beginning.
Mason Plumlee and Jerami Grant got out for back-to-back transition dunks. The Pistons would have been better off walking off the floor after that, 1991 style. RJ Barrett’s Birth of the Cool played Joe Louis Arena for 35 minutes of syncopated smooth. This bucket may have put the Knicks up for good on the night.
Rowan giveth and Rowan taketh away, blocking Grant on one push and stripping Josh Jackson on another. The Knicks were hitting from deep and the Pistons weren’t. Alec Burks continued his fine form of late with a quick 10 points, including a difficult 3-pointer with the shot clock running low on a possession that wasn’t going anywhere. The Burks/Frank Ntilikina/Immanuel Quickley/Obi Toppin/Nerlens Noel lineup featured some of the ugliest offense of the season. No one could penetrate or create. Just a lotta hopeless possessions.
Both teams stumbled a lot in transition. Halfway through the second, the Knicks had just 34 points. But they stayed in front, thanks in large part to another terrific performance from Noel, who had three blocks and altered at least twice that number. This was a nice find of Toppin for the easy dunk.
Julius Randle keeps hitting new levels of greatness. He continued a recent stretch of setting up teammates in the early stages of the game and looking to score later, another leap in his evolution from “Marcus Morris is better” to Mike Breen telling the story of Kobe Bryant, who played two years with Randle, calling him “Lamar Odom in a Zach Randolph body.” Raining jab-step 3-pointers and midrange fades, Randle scored 12 of New York’s 35 in the third quarter.
Rose drove and dished to Reggie Bullock for three, then found Noel for a dunk off a mwah! touch pass.
With the fourth quarter closer to done than not, the Knicks were shooting nearly 80% from the field for the second half. Win the air and you win the war: New York made half of their 26 3-pointers. On the one hand, the dominance they displayed reflects the larger surprise of their turnaround — this is the latest in a season the Knicks have been above .500 since 2013. On the other, this looked a lot like the four-seed whupping the worst team in the conference. The Pistons looked the part. The Knicks look more worthy of theirs with every game.
Notes
Noel: eight points, 11 rebounds, a couple assists, three blocks, three steals, 4-of-5 shooting. Depth. It’s a beautiful thing.
Toppin, who usually sticks to dribble handoffs with the solemnity of someone taking communion, threw a curveball and faked one before cutting to the basket and making a difficult lay-up. Go on and color outside those lines, Obi!
How you know your team is in playoff contention: Taj Gibson’s health is a big deal.
Doug Moe, these are your children.
MSG trivia: IQ already has three 4-point plays, sixth-most in team history. The most in Knicks history is 10, held by two players. Who?
OAKAAKUYOAKs DSJ and Wayne Ellington combined to take about one-quarter of all Detroit’s shots. Can you imagine?
When the Pistons are good, Detroit is always a tough place to play. When they’re not, they are so. Freaking. Boring. Imagine watching this team, with Blake Griffin out and likely destined for a trade or buyout, and lottery pick Killian Hayes out all year after just seven games.
Clyde called for the Knicks to declare Randle the captain. That seems unnecessarily formal, maybe, but it’s always cool hearing Clyde’s voice when you can tell he’s legit interested in the topic.
Trivia answer: Jamal Crawford and John Starks.
The Knicks keep movin’ on up. You know how it is, though. Whenever you get some money in your pocket, the costs of living find ways to keep up. The cost of these exciting new heights the Knicks keep hitting is simple but difficult: wins. To make the playoffs, that’s all you need. But winning isn’t usually as easy as it was last night. Next game is Tuesday in San Antonio, one that matters to both teams. The Knicks matter. That takes me back.
