The Knicks had Miles McBride, Mitchell Robinson, and Josh Hart, so they didn’t really need to acquire Jalen Brunson.
On Saturday at MSG, the Knicks overcame their star point guard’s Game 1 misfire and rode an unlikely hero to defeat the Sixers 111-104.
The Knicks outscored the Sixers by seven points in the final 10 minutes, with three timely treys from Hart, who atoned for a disappointing opening three quarters with clutch moments and ended up with 22 points and 13 rebounds. He left a record of.
McBride added 21 points in 28 minutes.
Robinson played the majority of the starting minutes, grabbed seven offensive boards and helped keep Joel Embiid in check late in the game.
It didn’t matter that Brunson, who lost to Tyrese Maxey, essentially disappeared under Kelly Oubre’s protective blanket.
Or that Brunson’s college roommate, Donte DiVincenzo, was also on the fight bus.
The starting guards combined for 30 points on just 11 of 36 shots.
Brunson went 8-for-26.
But the role players played well, and the Knicks won Game 1 at home against the Celtics for the first time since 2013.
Previously, it seemed like the entire series was about to change dramatically.
Embiid, the reigning MVP who finished Saturday with 29 points, dominated playing time but was clearly too accustomed to his surgically repaired left knee.
With about two and a half minutes left in the first half, the center threw an alley-oop to himself off the backboard for a dunk, but landed awkwardly on his surgically repaired knee.
He immediately fell to his knees on the court.
The 30-year-old, who had his meniscus repaired during the season, left for the locker room.
The Knicks, who led by five points at the time, ended the first half on an 11-2 run to take a 12-point lead.
But Embiid returned after the break with blood dripping from the left knee of his white tights.
The Sixers quickly tied the game and took a three-point advantage in the third quarter with a threadbare $10 goal from Embiid to Kelly Oubre in transition.
It set the stage for heroics from the Knicks’ role players in the fourth quarter.
Before the injury, Embiid went from “questionable” to not at all questionable.
The center was probably considered 50-50 to play considering the injury report, but it was a bit of a ruse (he was always going to try) and while pounding the paint. , no signs of limit were observed.
He scored 18 points in the first half.
Embiid looked more agile and confident than he did against the Heat three days earlier. At that time, the center was hesitant to get a takedown from a low position, and it stalled until the fourth quarter.
In the first half against the Knicks, Embiid made a low-down decision without hesitation.
“Miami is a tough team to play against,” Maxey explained in a television interview after the first quarter, hinting that the Knicks were somehow easier to deal with.
