OKLAHOMA CITY — This wasn’t the Toronto Raptors, Washington Wizards, Utah Jazz or other bottom-feeder team the New York Knicks have faced in recent weeks. This wasn’t the blah Minnesota Timberwolves or OK San Antonio Spurs, either. This wasn’t the mangled Orlando Magic. The New York Knicks’ opponent Friday night, with a nine-game win streak on the line, was one of the NBA’s best.
A Knicks-Oklahoma City Thunder early-January matchup was as important of a regular-season game as you’ll find in the dim days of the NBA calendar. No one wanted to acknowledge that, but it was. New York needed to prove its lengthy win streak, most of which came against teams that have the worst offenses in basketball, was more than just a really good team playing bully to some really bad ones. The Knicks, who were 0-3 against the top three seeds in either conference going into the game, needed a signature win.
New York didn’t get that, losing 117-107 to the ultra-impressive Thunder, who played the night before. However, the Knicks showed they can play with any team in basketball. A month ago, I didn’t believe that.
New York didn’t lose this game because it wasn’t as talented. It spent much of the night displaying the greatness of one of the best starting units in the game. The Knicks didn’t lose because they were out-coached. Tom Thibodeau and his staff did a good job of creating a game plan to contain the likes of Shai Gilgeous-Alexander and Jalen Williams, just like Oklahoma City coach Mark Daigneault did a good job of trying to make life difficult for Jalen Brunson and Karl-Anthony Towns. The turnovers were nearly identical on both sides. So were the rebounds. The free-throw attempts weren’t far off. This was a slugfest between a great team and a really good team that was decided in the game’s trenches.
“There were two or three scramble plays where they got the loose ball and it converted into 3s,” Thibodeau said about what he thought was the difference. “The last part of the defense has to be the strongest. That was probably the biggest thing. It was a hard-fought game, and in the end, it’s getting the loose balls and making effort plays.”
Thibodeau has talked ad nauseam about daily improvements, a cliche yet reasonable objective for a team that underwent such a huge makeover this offseason and has title aspirations. And it is possible to show that progress without winning. You don’t have to win a measuring-stick game to inch closer to where you have to go.
For the first 42 minutes, the Knicks were as good as or better than the Thunder. The Knicks’ second quarter was as good of a stretch as they’ve put together all season, and that’s saying something for one of the league’s best offenses. Those elite 3-and-D wings — OG Anunoby and Mikal Bridges — the team spent the past year acquiring were everything New York expects and more. By halftime, with the Knicks leading by 12, Anunoby and Bridges combined to go 13-for-21 from the floor for 34 points. The duo along with Josh Hart stifled the Thunder, holding them to 8-of-21 shooting in the second quarter. Few teams have done that to Oklahoma City this season.
OG ANUNO-THREE 🎯 pic.twitter.com/tirHlHcYQf
— NEW YORK KNICKS (@nyknicks) January 4, 2025
The Knicks offense can be as scary as it gets. Anyone can get you at any time. At halftime, every starter except Towns had double-digit points, and he went into the locker room with 8 points and 13 rebounds. Nothing to sneeze at.
Bridges was brought here to make shots and slow the NBA’s best guards. There’s no stopping someone like Gilgeous-Alexander, but Bridges did as good as anyone this season at making life difficult. He was the primary defender on Gilgeous-Alexander and helped hold him to under 50 percent shooting. The Oklahoma City star has done that only five times since Nov. 27.
The early-season concerns about Bridges are so far in the past that I shouldn’t have even brought them up here.
“Whoever we’re playing, whoever I’m guarding, I just watch their film,” Bridges said. “I think Shai, guys like that, who I’ve played against multiple times in the West, going against multiple times, have more reps guarding him. Shai is really good.”
In the third quarter, the Knicks did what the great teams do: take a jab and uppercut back. The NBA is a game of runs, and New York gave the Thunder a boost by turning the ball over four times within the first few minutes of the second half. Yet, the Knicks still led by double digits with just over three minutes to play in the third quarter.
Ultimately, New York lost because of the loose balls, timely second-chance points by the Thunder and great players like Gilgeous-Alexander and Williams being able to muster up just enough late in the game to help their team see it through. Oklahoma City flashed all of the characteristics of a team with continuity and added a player in Isaiah Hartenstein who, as Knicks fans know, can fit on any team.
You could point to Oklahoma City’s bench production versus that of the Knicks, who were without Miles McBride, I guess. The Thunder’s bench outscored the Knicks’ 44-5. But if there was a game to play your best players big minutes in, this was it. Unleashing the second unit wasn’t going to change the trajectory, especially with McBride out. I had no issue with Thibodeau playing all of his starters 40-plus minutes in regulation, something that hasn’t happened in New York since 2013 and last happened a year ago when the Golden State Warriors did it. The players didn’t, either.
As far as regular-season games go, it rarely gets bigger than this.
“At the end of the day, the fourth quarter is the time for you to go out there and win the game,” Hart said. “At that point, it’s just competitiveness and adrenaline pushing you through. I’ve always said that I want to be out there as much as I can. So at that point, we just have to make sure we execute.”
Defensively, New York did enough for 40 minutes. That wasn’t always the case earlier in the season. Offensively, it had an uncharacteristically bad 3-point shooting night (9-for-32) and still nearly took down the Western Conference’s top seed. Only one team, the Cleveland Cavaliers, shoots the deep ball with more accuracy than the Knicks this season.
From a national perspective, a victory over the Thunder would have validated a nine-game win streak against weaker foes. It would have shifted the narrative to include New York among the league’s elite. The Knicks aren’t quite there yet, but Friday showed they’re closer than they once were. And at the end of the day, as it pertains to basketball in January, that’s what matters.
The Knicks are going in the right direction.
(Photo of Karl-Anthony Towns: Alonzo Adams / Imagn Images)
