The Knicks don’t have the luxury to rest in their season finale.
Not after stinking it up in their last three games — three consecutive losses to the best in the East: first to the Boston Celtics, then to the same Detroit Pistons they’re penned into facing in the first round of the playoffs, and finally, a 23-point lead evaporated into a sobering loss to the Cleveland Cavaliers at Madison Square Garden on Friday.
No. The Knicks haven’t earned that right. Their second-straight 50-win season is now a footnote. What matters now is the slide, the inconsistency and the unsettling sense of a team spiraling up the standings but down in form.
And yet, because Indiana lost to Orlando on Friday, New York is locked in the East’s No. 3 seed regardless. The Knicks will host the sixth-seeded Pistons in Round 1. But their recent track record isn’t encouraging: 1-3 against Detroit, 0-4 against Boston, 0-4 against Cleveland. Zero wins against any of the NBA’s top-three seeds if you include the 0-2 swing against the Oklahoma City Thunder.
Zero confidence entering the postseason on a three-game skid, even if the team outwardly suggests otherwise.
“Does [losing these three] do anything to our confidence? No,” Josh Hart said after Friday’s loss. “Obviously we would have liked to get at least one if not both, but like I said, it’s playoff basketball, we have to flip the page. We have to focus on Brooklyn, ending the season off right, and then Detroit.”
This was supposed to be the season the Knicks ascended to the league’s top tier, backed by trades for Mikal Bridges and Karl-Anthony Towns. Instead, they’re limping into the playoffs with more questions than answers.
And only one game left to answer them.
So yes, Sunday’s finale against the Nets is technically meaningless. The seeding is set, and the Nets are locked into the sixth-best odds at No. 1 in the NBA Draft Lottery.
But the stakes? For the Knicks? They’ve never been higher. This team doesn’t need a victory for seeding.
It needs a win for its confidence.
“We have to go into this next game with the right mentality and right mindset and have a short-term memory,” said Jalen Brunson, steady as ever after Friday’s collapse. “We can’t let things like this linger on. It’s important to have short-term memory right now and continue to look forward. I know it’s tough. It sounds like it’s B.S., but it’s literally what we have to do right now in order for us to do better.”
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According to Tom Thibodeau, it starts in the mirror.
“We got to be honest with ourselves, look at what we did wrong,” the coach said. “We got to get it fixed. And we got to get it fixed fast.”
Friday’s loss stung more than most. The Cavs were without Donovan Mitchell, De’Andre Hunter, Ty Jerome and Sam Merrill. The Knicks, missing only Towns, built a 23-point first-half lead. And then gave it all back.
“We’ve got to play for 48 minutes — both sides of the ball,” Thibodeau said. “That’s the challenge that we have. We’ve got to have rhythm going into the playoffs. So this has to be changed quickly.”
The problem wasn’t just execution. It was identity. Like the Knicks had no answer for Cade Cunningham (36 points on Thursday) and had no answer for ...