Just when I thought we were hunting for the No. 1 overall pick in the 2027 NBA Draft…
…Mike Brown and the lads decided to get their excrement together and remind us the Knicks are actually a title contender.
Here’s the latest before we turn the page quickly to this evening’s affair against the Chicago Oxen.
Mike Brown
On facing the Pistons despite
Detroit dominating the Knicks last season:
“We have to concentrate on the next opponent in front of us, and Detroit happens to be that opponent. And, they had our number last year, you know. It is what it is, that’s kind of how the NBA is [and] it works. I said this before, one of the years we won it when I was in Golden State as an assistant. We lost the season series to Utah, I don’t know, it was 0-4, 1-3. One game, we got I think, beat by 40.
“So, you know, I don’t necessarily take a ton of [stock in it]. Obviously, you want to win, you want to be in good position for a playoff run, but I don’t take a ton of stock in, they won this series or they killed us in this [regular season] series because playoff season is a different ballgame.”
On experimenting with Jalen Brunson and Karl-Anthony Towns’ minutes and rotations during the first games of the season:
“No, no, no, no. You can always get better. You guys probably don’t notice, you probably never picked up on it but in Games 1 and 2 [of this season], my big experimentation was playing [Karl-Anthony Towns] and Jalen in two stretches together. And so the middle of it, I had both KAT and Jalen off the floor. We didn’t really do that last year.
“Watching it, I didn’t like it. So last game was the first game that I went back to [keeping one on the floor]. So there’s some things that I’m looking at or messing with that may or may not stay the same.
“That’s part of what you’re trying to do to figure out what’s best for your team long term. In the short term, it might not turn out good, like it didn’t turn out good not starting Josh, we took our lumps. But it was good to go through it last year. So, it’s something we’ll continue to try to figure out early on.”
On challenging Karl-Anthony Towns at halftime against the Pistons and his 27-20 outing:
“I challenged KAT and KAT had a tremendous second half. Twenty-seven and 20, he’s more than capable of doing that night in and night out.
“KAT’s a grown man. He’s obviously a perennial All-Star. I just told him the truth: ‘KAT, the guy is killing us on the glass, and when he gets a rebound, he’s putting it back. Anything he gets in the paint, he’s putting it back. If he catches on the perimeter, guard him,’”
“And he did those things. I’ve got to take my hat off to KAT because I thought his shift in his mindset was really big for us in the second half.”
On the Knicks dictating the physicality against Detroit:
“Once our guys realized, ‘No, no, I can’t react to them, I gotta dictate to them what’s gonna happen,’ and they do it with a smart level of physicality, then it makes it easier [to defend].”
On the Knicks putting together a more complete performance in their first win:
“We talk about trying to string a game together. 48 minutes of basketball the way we know how to play, and we like to play. And we had some lulls where we weren’t as physical as we should have been throughout the course of the game, but we had some really good moments. We had more good moments in this game in totality than we did in the first three games, and that’s why we got the win.”
On the Knicks’ early struggles being part of the process of preparing for the playoffs:
“We can have some hiccups. That’s what the [regular] season’s for. It’s trying to correct it, so come playoff time, you’re ready to go do what you need to do. So is it fixed? No, it ain’t fixed. Nothing’s really fixed.
“What tonight shows us is we’re more than capable if we put our minds to it. And that’s what we gotta continue to try to build off. And then if we do slip up, that we don’t slip up for eight minutes or 10 minutes. Maybe for a minute and a half, two minutes, and then we get back, regroup, and get back heading in the right direction again.”
On the Knicks’ shot selection and overall performance against Detroit:
“I still believe we took some really good shots. I believe if we keep taking the shots that we’re taking, they’re going to start going in sooner than later. But our guys played an overall good game. On the offensive glass, defensively physically, offensively physically.”
On the Knicks doing a better job defending Detroit’s designated shooters:
“The guys that we labeled hot tonight, two of the guys were obviously Duncan Robinson and [Daniss] Jenkins, and they were combined 3-for-16. So our awareness, our level of physicality, throughout the 48 minutes were a lot better on those two guys in the previous game.”
On the Knicks’ performance against Detroit compared with their first three losses:
“I give our guys credit. We talked about trying to string a game together, close to 48 minutes, the way we can play and like to play. We had some lulls where we weren’t as physical as we should have been. But we had some good moments. We had more good moments in totality than the first three games.”
On lessons from the Warriors’ 2018 championship defense and avoiding panic:
“The one thing that I do know [about that season] is nobody ever panicked, from the ownership to the [general manager] to coaching staff all down through players. We just truly felt we were better than the way we were playing.
“At that point in the season, to go through getting thumped in the head sometimes, might not be all bad, you know? So I think that’s the biggest thing is to know that you’ve got a game plan and you want to stay the course. Make some tweaks here, make some tweaks there.”
Jalen Brunson
On a challenging start to the season:
“Everyone can say it’s obviously early in the season. We could use that as an excuse. But I think the one thing that I see is when we get those runs, when we start to look like the team that we’ve been in the past, we get a little comfortable. So we’ve got to continue to put our foot on the gas and execute things that we did last year.
“And we’re not going to be the same. We’re not going to be the way we were playing last year. That’s just human nature. But we have to accept this part of the journey, find a way to be better. And hopefully, throughout a couple of games, we’re going to look back on it and say, ‘Yeah, we grew from that.’”
On responding to early-season adversity and the sky-high expectations of a title defense:
“Find whatever it takes to win. Control what we can control. Focus on the little details that might seem small but can impact winning. Most importantly, stick together. One thing I’ve said during training camp and to this day is we’re going to see who we are within the first couple weeks of the season. And we’re seeing adversity so how are we going to respond?
“We’re going to get everyone’s best because of last year. Everyone has been telling us what a great job we did, how fun it was, what we did for the city, the constant praise and so we need to be the opposite.”
On the Knicks’ identity after earning their first win:
“We’re the Knicks, actually.”
On the Knicks’ defensive turnaround against Detroit:
“We talked about it and we knew we needed to do it. I think the way we played that second quarter really turned things around and helped us take control of the game.”
On the Knicks’ need for patience:
“We got to remember that Rome wasn’t built in a day. This is a new year, new team. Adversity started early, so we just gotta fight back. We have a long way to go, but obviously we want to learn from wins as much as we do from losses. Excited we came up with the win today.”
On Karl-Anthony Towns stepping up against Paul Reed and the Pistons on Tuesday:
“[Reed] played great in the first half. I think we were able to not let him loose on the offensive boards. He was really impacting the game. For [KAT] to step up as he did throughout the game was something that we needed.”
On Josh Hart’s sources of energy:
“Popcorn, candy, wine and caffeine. He’s just a different person.”
Karl-Anthony Towns
On staying optimistic despite the Knicks’ 0-3 start:
“As much as you lose nine out of 11, it’s the way you can win 13 straight. So just stay faithful, stay faithful, continue to put the work in, continue to find different ways we could be better. We’ve just gotta get back to the drawing board. Back to what made us so special last year. We have to tap back into that kind of mojo, that magic, and find ways to do what we got to do to get it back up.”
On the Knicks resembling last season’s championship team against Detroit:
“More like ourselves from last year.”
On the Knicks increasing their physicality and intensity against the Pistons:
“I thought we did a better job picking up our intensity and our physicality, and we just executed at a high level. We’ve just got to worry about the controllables, which is us playing our best, executing at a high level, and bringing that physicality to the game.”
On the Knicks executing the fundamentals against Detroit:
“We did all the little things tonight. That’s how we got the W.”
On the need for building momentum after the first win:
“Gotta get the next one. Build off of this game and continue to improve as a team. All year it’s gonna be us improving, going through the ups and downs of a season. We just gotta stay steady, keep believing in each other, keep pushing each other to another level.”
On wanting to reward Knicks fans after three disappointing losses:
“It’s been an ongoing thing. These fans deserve the best of us and we haven’t given them that the first three games. We wanted to give them something to cheer for.”
