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Chris Herring, ESPN senior writer
IN OCTOBERAfter the New York Knicks blew a 13-point second-half lead to lose a winnable game to the Cleveland Cavaliers, the home locker room was eerily quiet.
Some of that was the nature of the defeat; The Cavs had shown more toughness and hustle to achieve victory, traits that have long defined teams coached by Tom Thibodeau. But some of the quiet tones also came from an obvious number on the stat sheet.
Karl-Anthony Towns, the big shooter acquired from the Minnesota Timberwolves at the start of camp and with a $220 million contract, had taken just eight shot attempts. When asked about Towns’ limited appearance that night, Knicks guard and team captain Jalen Brunson acknowledged that he needed to do more to get the ball to his center.
“No matter how good Karl is, there is no way [for a defense] to get him out of a game. It’s up to us and me to make sure we’re on the same page and make sure everyone eats,” Brunson said from his corner locker. “I’ve got to adjust better and I’ve got to watch him.”
Even more disconcerting: The low shot total against Cleveland had become something of a trend. During his first three games as a Knick, the four-time All-Star had averaged nine shots per game, fewer than any member of the starting five, even though he had posted the best true shooting percentage of that five man. cluster.
It didn’t take long (two days, to be exact) until the problem was rectified.
With Brunson looking to facilitate, Towns lit up the Miami Heat’s top-10 defense, scoring 44 points on 17-of-25 shooting and marking a turnaround for the Knicks’ offense, which ranks third in the NBA and has seen Towns go from last among the team’s starting five in shots per game and first since that Oct. 28 loss to Cleveland.
“Things are coming to them a lot easier than last year,” an Eastern Conference scout told ESPN of the Knicks’ 16-10 start. “We knew the spacing would be better with Towns, but I didn’t think they’d be humming like that so fast.”
The transformation, for New York and for Towns, who is in the midst of a professional season when he returns to Minnesota on Thursday (9:30 p.m. ET, TNT), raises a tantalizing question: With Towns playing so well, what is the new ceiling for New York after consecutive second-round eliminations?
THE EXPLOSIVE POTENTIAL It was evident, almost immediately. Late in the first half of the Knicks’ second game of the season, Brunson dribbled around a Towns screen and probed the right side of the court, forcing Indiana Pacers guard Andrew Nembhard and center Myles Turner to to make a decision. They both followed Brunson.
But then Brunson stopped abruptly, squared his body and fired a pass to Towns, who had been left wide open. Turner tried to close but was painfully late. His shoulders slumped as the ball slid through the net to give the Knicks a 16-point lead as time expired in the first half. The Garden exploded with joy. And Towns, who had maintained his drive from the 3-point arc, remained in place, moving in celebration.
This It was exactly what the Knicks envisioned for this duo: a dynamic pick-and-pop ability that simply overwhelms a defense that has no idea who to stick with in the split-second pick. Should they prioritize the sturdy guard, who last season became the first player since Michael Jordan to post four consecutive 40-point performances in the playoffs, or should they focus on Towns, who has made 40% of his 3-point attempts your career and perhaps you did it correctly? Did he call himself the greatest shooter in basketball history?
It’s an impossible call, and on that October night, the Pacers simply couldn’t respond as the Knicks cruised to a 25-point home victory.
The Knicks, who featured one of the league’s most stagnant iso-based offenses last season, now have a terrifying option.
Brunson and Towns are blitzing defenses for 121 points per 100 possessions in pick-and-pop scenarios, and the Knicks as a team rank second in the league in those types of plays. They have made a massive 19-point improvement from last season, when Brunson and the Knicks ranked 29th in the NBA in pick-and-pop scoring efficiency.
Towns’ offensive impact extends far beyond the pick-and-pop game. The space his shot provides paves the way for one of the most creative finishers in the NBA. It’s no coincidence that Brunson, who shot 61% at the rim two seasons ago and 63% last year, is up to 67%. On average, Brunson has had 1.25 players contest his layups and floaters this season when Towns is on the court, according to Second Spectrum tracking. To put it in context, that number jumps to 1.47 players contesting Brunson drives with Towns on the bench.
Teams simply can’t help defenders quick enough when Towns is on the court. That’s why New York is shooting nearly 71%, a 15-point year-over-year improvement. “The floor will be wide open. The rim will be there,” wing Josh Hart presciently said of the Knicks’ potential space after the Towns trade.
He was right.
Towns himself has taken advantage of the space in the paint, scoring a career-high 1.21 points per drive, a rate that ranks seventh in the NBA among players with 150 drives or more.
The metric illustrates the vicious cycle it presents to defenders: If you get too close to him, you abandon dunks. If you give it too much space, like Turner did, it seems like it will end badly too. Towns is shooting 52% (25 of 48) on open 3-pointers a third of the way through the season.
Of course he has contributed more to the Knicks than scoring. Fans and analysts alike feared Towns couldn’t replace the elite passing and rebounding of center Isaiah Hartenstein, who left for the Oklahoma City Thunder in free agency.
But two months later, Towns has all but eased those concerns. Teammates are throwing 55.4% of Towns’ passes, not only the highest mark on the Knicks, but one of the top 10 rates in the league among players with at least 100 assist opportunities. (With Towns, New York is moving the ball much better than in recent years, when it finished last and next to last in assist percentage in 2022-23 and 2023-24, respectively. The Knicks rank 13th this season.)
“The passing has really evolved,” Thibodeau said of Towns last month. “He’s always been unselfish and a team-first guy, but now I think he really sees things. He understands what the defense is trying to do.”
But the towns bouncing It could be the biggest revelation of all. In addition to becoming the first player since Shaquille O’Neal in 1996-97 to record 500 points and 250 rebounds in his first 20 games with a new team, Towns is grabbing an NBA-high 13.9 rebounds per game.
The 29-year-old, who grabbed 8.3 rebounds per game last season, is experiencing the NBA’s largest single-season rebound increase in more than 30 years.
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Karl-Anthony Towns denies the Atlanta Hawks with things
Karl-Anthony Towns denies things to the Atlanta Hawks.
THEN THERE IS THE defense. Through the first few weeks of the season, New York (trying to add a new point-of-attack defender in Mikal Bridges and a new rim protector in Towns) couldn’t stop much of anything. Through Nov. 10, opponents were shooting 78% on layups and dunks against Towns when he was the opposing defender, a mark that ranked last in the NBA among players with at least 50 shots defended at that point in the season. season.
“They were a tourniquet,” the Eastern scout said. “Bridges was slow to get around screens and Towns dropped too low to hit the ball handler. Almost every time, that’s what happened. Teams attacked his sore spot.”
However, to his credit, Towns has limited opposing shooters to just 52% on layups and dunks from November 11 onward. That’s a tremendously encouraging sign for the Knicks as they await Mitchell Robinson’s return from ankle surgery.
This doesn’t mean there still aren’t occasional growing pains. Last week, in the NBA Cup quarterfinals against the Hawks, Towns got into foul trouble (something he has long struggled with) and his time on the bench allowed Atlanta to dominate on the glass and come back to win. They finished with 22 offensive rebounds, prompting Hawks center Clint Capela to say the Hawks “[took the Knicks’] soul” after eliminating New York from the tournament.
Still, as fundamentally as Towns has changed his offense, even with the initial defensive shortcomings, it’s clear why the organization felt comfortable making the high-profile trade for him. And if Towns maintains this level of play, the move could take the team even further: to its first conference finals in 25 years.
Matt Williams of ESPN Research contributed to this story.
