Kenny Atkinson never considered benching James Harden — and it cost Cavs Game 1 of Eastern Conference finals

NEW YORK — The strategy was ruthless — but it wasn’t complex, it wasn’t a secret and it was preventable.

Each time down the floor, Knicks coach Mike Brown gestured toward his captain, Jalen Brunson, imploring him to get the ball and pull Cavs veteran James Harden into the screening action.

When Cleveland willingly gave the soft switch, Brown stomped toward the floor, frantically waved his arms like a Manhattan traffic cop and shouted at the other four players to get out of Brunson’s way.

This happened eight straight times in the fourth quarter of New York’s 115-104 overtime win in Game 1 of the Eastern Conference finals.

The Knicks stunned the Cavaliers with a miraculous 22-point fourth-quarter comeback, the second-largest in the past 30 postseasons. It also marks the largest playoff comeback in Knicks franchise history since 1970.

Entering Tuesday, teams trailing by 22 points in the fourth quarter of the playoffs held a record of 1-594.

Gutsy rally or crushing collapse?

The answer is yes to both.

And Cavs coach Kenny Atkinson was one of the primary culprits.

With 7:52 remaining in the fourth quarter, the Cavs had a game-high 22-point advantage

New York’s top-ranked offense was out of sync, forcing mistake-prone center Karl-Anthony Towns away from the basket and limiting Brunson. At the other end, the offense flowed, as the ball whizzed around, inside to outside, side to side.

Madison Square Garden — a bright-light house of horrors for Cleveland in the past — was a mixture of silent, baffled and angry, with fans grumbling.

At that point, the Cavs had a 99.9%-win probability.

But the Knicks, led by Brunson mercilessly targeting Harden, used an 18-1 run to pull within five at the 3:30 mark. Brunson punctuated that push with a clutch pull-up 3-pointer that led to him having words for Cleveland’s bench, staring down Atkinson and yelling at the back of Atkinson’s head while he finally signaled for a timeout.

Too late. The damage was already done.

During those four-plus minutes, Atkinson gave a mostly rhythmless Knicks offense exactly what it wanted — and needed — to ignite the comeback. He allowed Brunson to get comfortable, didn’t make a schematic change and never considered taking a clearly exhausted Harden off the floor.

“He’s been one of our best defenders in these playoffs,” Atkinson said of Harden. “I trust him. Smart, great hands. Didn’t think about that. James was good most of the game.”

During that postgame press conference, Atkinson said his “only” regret was not doing enough to keep the offense from self-destructing in the fourth quarter.

His only regret?

That means he stands by the preposterous Harden decision — even though it led to Brunson making five straight shots and scoring 16 of his game-high 38 points in the fourth.

Brunson finished the game shooting 7 of 11 when defended by Harden, including 7 of 8 in the fourth quarter. One of the few stops came as Harden drew an embellished offensive foul. When guarded by any other Cavalier, including defensive stopper Dean Wade who was subbed out of the game in the midst of that onslaught, Brunson went 8 of 18 from the field.

“It was no secret: We were attacking Harden,” Brown said. “Just like we have to figure out different ways to guard Harden and [Donovan] Mitchell, they have to find ways to guard Jalen. You got to do what the game dictates. They were doing the same thing with Jalen so we said, two can play that game.”

Benching any star is a delicate decision, especially given Harden’s unquantifiable importance to Cleveland’s offense.

Not many coaches are willing to do it.

Golden State’s Steve Kerr, one of Atkinson’s mentors, stayed with Stephen Curry during the 2016 NBA Finals when he kept getting picked on by Kyrie Irving. Brown left Brunson in despite Cleveland’s own first-half hunting strategy.

The belief (hope?) is they will help other ways.

If Atkinson didn’t view that as an option, then he needed to mitigate the problem another way.

Changing the defense a little earlier would’ve been an option.

Stop switching. Let Wade hedge-and-recover. Blitz more aggressively. Elbows and boxes behind the switch. See if Max Strus’ size could be bothersome.

How does Atkinson just let Brunson get the matchup he wants against Harden over and over and over and over without any resistance?

In the tracking era of regular season or playoffs, guarding eight isolations in a single quarter has only happened 30 times.

Total.

“Held him a check most of the game,” Atkinson said when asked about the defensive effort on Brunson. “It was basically the fourth quarter. He got loose. We definitely tried to mix up some stuff. Tried to throw some stuff at him. We’ll have to keep looking at it. Hit a lot of his tough floaters and hit that tough contested 3. I felt like they hit a lot of tough shots. I mean, what are you going to do?”

Once the Knicks cut it to five, the Cavs started sending multiple defenders at Brunson, trying to get the ball out of his hands — a similar tactic used during the second-round series against Detroit’s Cade Cunningham. But it was more of a half-hearted approach this time. The Knicks, with five shooters and a timely Landry Shamet substitution, were prepared. And those last-ditch efforts were futile.

“Listen, we weren’t great defensively in the fourth quarter,” Atkinson admitted. “They hit some really tough shots in that fourth quarter. We got a little unlucky, quite honestly. Brunson obviously took over at the end. Tried to do some different things. But I’m super proud of the way our group played. We played great basketball tonight for three quarters. Unfortunately, they dominated us in the fourth quarter.”

It was the same story in overtime.

The Knicks outscored the Cavs 32-18 in the fourth quarter, 30-8 over the final 7:52 of regulation and 14-3 in OT.

Brunson was the catalyst.

“He made some tough ones,” Harden said of Brunson. Obviously, we all know he’s a great one-on-one player and I think anybody on an island, it’s going to be difficult. We’ve got to do a better job of making sure he sees bodies. We’ve got to do a better job as a team just because it’s not a one-man job. Got to be better in that aspect. He made a couple, which really got them going.”

The Cavs have had some crushing setbacks in the postseason. They lost on a buzzer-beater in Toronto after RJ Barrett’s shot bounced high above the rim before dropping, forcing Game 7. They no-showed in Game 6 at home against the Pistons in the conference semifinals.

Like those other ones, Tuesday night seemed avoidable.

Mitchell could have been better. Even though he finished with a team-high 29 points, Mitchell went scoreless in OT and made just one basket over the final 17 minutes of game action. There were a few instances when Mitchell seemed to fall awkwardly, but he denied dealing with any injury and said he wanted to review the film to better understand his lack of involvement down the stretch.

Harden, apart from being a defensive turnstile, mustered just 15 points. He had more turnovers (6) than made field goals (5), the sixth time that has happened in Cleveland’s first 15 playoff games.

And then there was Atkinson who made a few too many tactical blunders. He inexplicably used just one timeout during New York’s 30-8 late-game surge — despite having two use it or lose it timeouts. His adjustments were slow and reactive. He was unable to keep his team from unraveling — again.

There are no do-overs in the playoffs. There are no moral victories. It doesn’t matter that the Cavs think they played well for 36 minutes. They should have won this game — and they didn’t.

It’s the only thing that matters.

“We literally let one slip away, but we got a lot of positives out of this game,” Harden said. “We’ll just watch film and figure out what we can correct and put an entire game together.”

“It’s one loss. It’s a bad loss. It’s not like that loss gives them two or three games,” Mitchell added. “We’re up 22. That can’t happen. We [expletive] blew it. But you watch the film and you get ready for Game 2. We have an opportunity to come back here in two days and steal one here. That’s really all it is.”

And maybe Atkinson won’t leave Harden isolated against one of the league’s premier scorers.