Just two days remain until the beginning of the Knicks’ playoff journey against the Atlanta Hawks, and there are a lot of compelling storylines with this series.
While the Knicks are favored, national pundits believe this series will be among the closer ones in the first round of the NBA playoffs, so what do the Knicks need to do to silence the critics and get to Round 2 unscathed?
Controlling the Pace
There are inherent, stylistic differences between the Knicks and Hawks that will be apparent throughout the series.
The
Knicks, despite their head coach being hired to increase the pace, remain a half-court-based offense that prefers to take its time to find the best shot. The head of the snake, Jalen Brunson, crosses half court with 16 on the shot clock every possession. 10.7 percent of their shot attempts are with four or fewer seconds on the shot clock, which is fifth in basketball. They’ve found a way to be a top-five offense with this strategy, so they haven’t tried to change it.
Compare that to Atlanta, which is fifth in the NBA in pace and will often try to sprint up the court regardless of how the previous possession ended to get into the frontcourt with 20 on the shot clock. The stylistic difference can be described best with this:
Percent of shot attempts with 4 and 7 or fewer seconds on the shot clock:
Knicks: 10.7%, 21.6%
Hawks: 7.7%, 13.3%
Percent of shots with at least 15 on the shot clock:
Knicks: 32.3%
Hawks: 41.6%
The Knicks take their time, the Hawks want to run. The Hawks are third in fastbreak points with 18.1, while the Knicks are 14th. Whoever is able to play their game will have a massive advantage in this series.
We saw this with the Pacers the last two seasons. The Knicks let them play to their pace and struggled mightily. The Knicks are vulnerable in transition defensively, but are able to sink their teeth in once they get in the halfcourt. The Knicks are the second-most efficient offense when it comes to shooting “grenades”, while the Hawks are middle-of-the-pack. They thrive when they have to make tough shots.
If the Knicks can hold down the Hawks in transition like they did down the stretch of these teams’ most recent meeting earlier this month, they’ll have a lot of success in this series.
Containing Nickeil Alexander-Walker
The easiest way an underdog can pull off an upset is a breakout performance that puts the league on notice. There aren’t many players capable of doing this on the Hawks, and as good as Jalen Johnson is, he isn’t a threat to average 30 for a series.
Alexander-Walker could be. The cousin of reigning NBA MVP Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, he left the shadows of Anthony Edwards in Minnesota and has done his best Jalen Brunson impression in thriving for his new team. He should win Most Improved Player and he showed what he can do when everything is clicking earlier this month against the Knicks:
It wasn’t your typical “leave a role player open, and he makes you pay”; he was cooking on some high-difficulty shots. If the Hawks have any chance in this series, he needs to be going shot-for-shot with Brunson and not be sitting in the corner down the stretch, which is part of the reason the Hawks melted down late in the early April matchup.
Dominate the Paint
This one is pretty clear. One team has Mitchell Robinson and Karl-Anthony Towns, the other has Onyeka Okongwu and Tony Bradley. The Hawks just effectively ruled out Jock Landale for the series, so there’s no reinforcements coming for an overmatched Atlanta center rotation.
Towns has had two efficient and dominant games against the Hawks this season and Okongwu has had absolutely no answer for him. While they could switch a wing onto Towns and put Okongwu on Josh Hart, that won’t work out well for them if Towns is assertive with the ball in his hands. As for Robinson, the Hawks will need to put several bodies on him to keep him off the glass, but that might not even be enough.
On that note, the Hawks are bigger than the Knicks pretty much everywhere else but center, so the Knicks will need Robinson and Towns to gobble up boards and not let one of Atlanta’s wings pick up loose balls and run out in transition.
