NEW YORK – Ladies and gentlemen, we have a series.
Deservedly. The Knicks and Spurs have played three straight thrilling, back-and-forth games that became one-possession contests at some point in the final minute. The aggregate score is Knicks 321, Spurs 314, a mere seven-point difference across three games. Anything other than 2-1 at this point would be a gross misrepresentation of the difference in quality between these two sides, not to mention throwing some shade at the overall level of play we’ve seen in the three games so far.
To be clear, New York still has the advantage: The Knicks are halfway to four and still have two home games left. If your “prior” entering the series was that the two teams were evenly matched and you treated each game as a coin flip, the mere fact of New York’s 2-1 edge would give it a 70 percent chance of winning the series.
Also, the inevitable fact that the Knicks’ magical win streak would come to an end doesn’t mean they suddenly lost the ability to conjure up brilliant stretches of basketball; even in this game, they had a 42-point eruption in the second quarter that included a 14-3 avalanche in the final three minutes, briefly leaving my colleagues to ponder the possibility of spending Saturday at the golf course.
Instead, we’ll play at least one more game in San Antonio, and nobody will be shocked if we end up back here in New York three days after that. The Spurs are behind, but they still have a chance to be party poopers.
So, instead, let’s talk about why we have a series, and maybe show a little appreciation for these two teams and the phenomenally high level of play they’ve achieved in their best moments. (Even on a night that didn’t always include those best moments, both teams had their lapses: the Knicks uncharacteristically made several grade-school-level turnovers on the perimeter, while the Spurs committed multiple senseless fouls.)
The big-picture difference on Monday was that San Antonio’s offense finally showed up, and, in particular, that the Spurs didn’t combust with atrocious decisions in transition. San Antonio has run less often and more effectively in each game, with disastrously itchy trigger fingers in Game 1 (32.0 percent of possessions, 0.98 points per possession, according to Primestats.net) and brutal conversion rates in Game 2 (23.5 percent of possessions and 0.83 ppp) giving way to more targeted and effective transitions (just 12.9 percent of possessions, but 1.58 ppp).
The Spurs also won the free-throw battle decisively, a hot topic after Mike Brown’s complaints following the game, but an unconvincing allegation. First of all, there is no rule or implied guarantee that the two teams will shoot the same amount of foul shots. The Knicks were 24th in the NBA in free-throw rate in the regular season, and the Spurs ranked No. 1 among teams at avoiding sending opponents to the line; what did you think would happen?
I’ll also note here that “free throws” and “fouls” aren’t the same thing. San Antonio was called for 21 fouls against 23 for the Knicks in Game 3; New York has been called for exactly 23 every single game, and the Spurs for 20, 21 and 23.
Yes, one particularly egregious foul by Victor Wembanyama on Jalen Brunson in the first half of Game 3 was very obviously missed. Otherwise? Move along everyone – there is nothing to see here. The Spurs are likely to win the free-throw battle every game, just because that’s how these teams played all season, much as the Knicks are likely to win the turnover battle and shoot more from midrange. These are just underlying stylistic facts of how the teams play, not some nefarious plot to favor a big and important market such as New York.
Instead, let’s circle back to the good stuff. Both these teams are incredibly easy to root for, with attractive playing styles and likable, interesting players and staff (with perhaps one glaring exception).
Moreover, styles make fights, and this one is compelling. At the most memorable moments, the Knicks and Spurs have brought out the best in each other. Earlier this week, I cited an example from Friday’s Game 2 where the Knicks’ “sprays” stayed one step ahead of the Spurs defense until finally they landed a wide-open corner 3 for Mikal Bridges with two-tenths of a second on the shot clock. In a game New York otherwise won with its defense, it was an example of beautiful connected offense breaking down an elite defense to generate an easy shot.
Well, Monday gave us a few glaring counter-examples. The Knicks, for instance, had another “four-spray” sequence in the first half similar to the one in Game 2, except the Spurs tracked it much better and forced a contested “grenade” in the corner from OG Anunoby that he – in the process of playing out of his freaking mind all night – somehow converted.
However, from San Antonio’s side, it gets better. After halftime, the Spurs came back with another sequence that underscored how this squad had the league’s third-best defense in the regular season and second-best in the playoffs.
With 4:08 left, the Knicks came out of a timeout trailing by eight points and got the Spurs off balance almost immediately with an off-ball screen for Brunson that turned into a slip for Landry Shamet. With 13 seconds left on the shot clock, Shamet had two feet in the paint and all five Spurs players were on one side of the court.
By all rights, San Antonio should have been absolutely cooked here, especially against an offensive team like the Knicks that can reliably make the next pass in the sequence against the rotating defense. Amazingly, the Spurs stayed with them every step of the way, New York never got an open shot, and Wembanyama ended up stuffing Shamet at the rim seven seconds later.
This is absolutely elite stuff all around, a whirlwind of the Knicks finding the net opening and making the right play, and the Spurs scrambling like mad to plug each new hole in the dike before finally Wembanyama seals it with a block at the rim.
Watch it again, and look beyond Wemby:
- De’Aaron Fox guarded four players and, in perhaps the most key part in the middle, flew out of the paint and sold out to take away an open Karl-Anthony Towns 3-point attempt.
- Dylan Harper pre-switched a pindown for Brunson to take his look away, and then scrambled into a lightning-quick close-out to take away another potential 3 for Brunson.
- Devin Vassell flew out to the corner when it looked like Anunoby would have a wide-open fungo on the pass from Shamet, forcing his next pass out to Towns.
- Stephon Castle denied Brunson at the start of the play, switched onto Josh Hart and fought over a screen to stay with him, left him to stunt toward Towns after he shot-faked Fox, and got back in the play for the defensive board.
- And Wembanyama, before the block, left Anunoby in the corner to close off a threat from the opposite side of the court.
Finally, note what didn’t happen: Wembanyama didn’t come flying out of the paint to close out on a shooter at the top of the key, leaving him able to track Shamet when the ball came to him in the corner. That’s by design.
“At this point,” Fox said, “when you’ve played a team so many times, you know what they’re going to do. They know what you’re going to do. They got us in rotations and … teams want to get Vic out of the paint. You know that’s not a secret. We have gotten good about rotating around him, and he’s gotten better at closing out to shooters, getting guys off the line while trying to stay in front of them.
“So, with someone like Landry, who obviously … shoots the leather off the ball, he got him off the line. We’re scrambling around him. Does he want to finish over him or not? He elected to try to finish over him, he blocked the shot. If he passed the ball out, we’re ‘x’-ing. [“X” is a defensive technique where the closest defender to the ball jumps to the first pass, usually necessitating a paint defender to make an “x” by crossing his path to make the second rotation to the next shooter.] We’re ‘x’-ing around Vic. We’re scrambling. And that’s the way that we, I think we’ve guarded them pretty well.”
What’s wild is that this play was also great offense by the Knicks, even if it didn’t get a result.
Watch it again: The Knicks accepted the ball denial in the backcourt on Brunson and had him set a screen so they could switch a weaker defender onto him. Then Brunson ran into a corner pin-in from Shamet – an unusual wrinkle out of the timeout that might have caught the Spurs off guard, but Harper was on top of it and jumped the pass early.
Shamet noticed Harper’s move right away and slipped the screen, cutting for what might have been a backdoor layup against a normal-sized rim protection. Even then, Shamet makes the right kickout to Anunoby, who hits Towns at the top of the key. It took two incredible rotations to prevent either one of them from launching a wide-open 3.
About the only thing you could criticize was Shamet’s final shoot-pass decision, when he might have hit Hart in the corner and put the Spurs in the blender for another pass or two.
“That was one of the plays of the night,” Spurs coach Mitch Johnson said.
“It was a really good possession in terms of multiple efforts, anticipating what your teammate was going to do. And then Victor was there, obviously, doing what he does best to clean it up at the rim.”
And that play is a microcosm of the brilliance we’ve seen from both sides through so much of these first three games — not just scintillating individual talent, but a level of teamwork and coordination rarely seen at any level of basketball.
Get yer popcorn and enjoy it for as long as it lasts. Usually we require three elements for history to remember a “great” series: A high standard of play overall, individual games decided in the final minute(s) and a close series that goes at least six games. We’ve already checked the first two boxes and seem well on our way to the third. Halfway through (roughly), these NBA Finals have a chance to be an all-time classic.
