Knicks' OG Anunoby downplays elbow issue but is questionable for Kings
Knicks forward OG Anunoby dunks against the 76ers during the second half of an NBA game Tuesday at Madison Square Garden. Credit: AP/Mary Altaffer
SACRAMENTO, Calif. — It was just another night for the Knicks on Thursday, with Jalen Brunson bailing them out despite getting very little offensive help and the team navigating through another injury scare.
Against a skeleton Trail Blazers crew, Brunson’s 45-point performance was enough for the Knicks to survive and advance, 105-93. But it was additional evidence of how fragile their situation is.
The story wasn’t the scoring explosion for Brunson but rather the alarming condition of OG Anunoby, playing in his second game after undergoing a surgical procedure to remove loose fragments from his right elbow. Anunoby was a late addition to the injured list for Saturday’s game against the Kings, listed as questionable because of “right elbow, injury management.”
Anunoby reached in for a steal in the second quarter Thursday and immediately grasped at the elbow. He left the game and had a heating pad strapped to his elbow. After halftime, he tried one shot before retreating to the bench, speaking with the trainers and sitting through the warmup session. But he was back in the lineup to start the second half and played 35:43 despite repeatedly grabbing the elbow. People near the court said he repeatedly shouted in pain while trying to play through the issue.
As he has been just about every time he has stepped on the floor for the Knicks, Anunoby was a difference-maker. Points-wise (12), it wasn’t near the 45 from Brunson. But with nine rebounds and a pair of timely steals, he was a defensive deterrent at every turn.
“Yeah, just him being on the court is a difference-maker,” Brunson said. “The things he can do are just so natural. Obviously, we’re glad he’s back. The things he can do just makes us a better team.”
Anunoby has helped turn the Knicks’ season around. They are 14-2 in games in which he has appeared since his arrival in a Dec. 30 trade with Toronto.
“It’s just sore,” he said. “Nothing really happened. Just went for a ball. And it hurt randomly, but it’s fine. It’s going to be sore. So that’s expected. I’m just starting to play. It’s going to be fine.”
“So there’s gonna be bumps and bruises in every game,” Tom Thibodeau said. “And then you check after the game, you check in the morning. But we were expecting there to be some bumps and bruises like that.”
And maybe they were right, that this is not an injury to be worried about despite his clear discomfort but simply an expected residual effect from the return from surgery. Anunoby insisted that he isn’t even thinking about sitting out Saturday.
The expectation was that the surgery would repair the issue of the loose fragments and that from there, it would just be rehabilitating completely from the procedure. Anunoby said after his first game back on Tuesday that he will ice the elbow after every game and workout. During Thursday’s game, he had a heat pack wrapped on the elbow to keep it warm when he left the game, in addition to the brace he has worn since his return.
For the Knicks to manage their way to the finish line of the season, they need Anunoby to stay healthy and they need to get Julius Randle back on the floor.
For Anunoby, the path forward means rehabilitation and rest when he can find it. And that might come on Saturday.
Steve Popper covers the Knicks for Newsday. He has spent nearly three decades covering the Knicks and the NBA, along with just about every sports team in the New York metropolitan area.
