Knicks seem stunned after being upended by Heat
Heat guard Kyle Lowry defends Knicks guard Jalen Brunson in the second quarter during Game 1 of the Eastern Conference Semifinals at Madison Square Garden on Sunday. Credit: Newsday/J. Conrad Williams Jr.
There was something eerily familiar about the dazed and confused look on the faces of Knicks fans as they walked out of Madison Square Garden Sunday afternoon.
The Miami Heat have a way of doing that to you. Just ask Milwaukee Bucks fans. A play-in team that is missing one of its top scorers, the Heat were supposed to have the shortest of postseasons.
Instead, Miami followed up a stunning first-round upset of the top-seeded Bucks Sunday with a 108-101 Game 1 win in front of a hostile Knicks crowd that was fired up to be watching second-round basketball at the Garden for the first time in a decade.
Could it be that the Heat were just faking it in the regular season? Or are they an organization that is just so confident after making it to the playoffs in 12 of their last 15 seasons that they can mess around for 82 games and then get their act together when it matters?
Because when you look at the final box from Sunday’s game, it really is a head scratcher.
The Knicks led by 12 points midway through the second quarter, but slowly let the Heat climb back into the game until Miami took the lead for good on a Kevin Love three-pointer that made it 66-64 with 7:26 left.
Jimmy Butler was again a giant thorn in his opponent's side, scoring 25 points with 11 rebounds, four assists and two steals in 35 minutes. His final five minutes on the court also personified the toughness his team showed throughout the playoffs.
After rolling his ankle when he was fouled by Josh Hart with 5:05 left, Butler writhed in pain on the floor for a good three minutes. After hobbling to the bench, he returned to hit two free throws and played out the rest of the game despite the fact it was clear he couldn’t move all that well.
Butler, however, wasn’t the only player giving the Knicks fits. Gabe Vincent, an undrafted player who had spent three years in the G-League when the Heat signed him before the 2020 season, hit five of Miami’s 13 three pointers and finished with 20 points. And 37-year-old Kyle Lowry, who fought a leg injury during the season and averaged just 7.6 points against the Bucks, came off the bench Sunday to score 18 with six assists against the Knicks.
"He’s an absolute winner,” Heat coach Erik Spoelstra said of the six-time All-Star. “And when you need him most, that’s when he’s going to show up. These kind of environments at this point in his career when this place was electric, that’s all that Kyle wants at this point.”
It’s also the kind of environment that Spoelstra loves. Sunday’s win was the 101st postseason win of his career, moving him past Larry Brown for fifth place among coaches all time. That alone has to help the psyche of his team, knowing they have a guy who has been there multiple times when they take the court.
To be fair, the Knicks were without Julius Randle, their leading scorer. Randle, who has a sprained ankle, can’t get back on the court soon enough. Even so, the Knicks had plenty enough on their roster to win the game without him if they had been able to knock down more than seven three-pointers.
"Today I was horrific. It’s very uncharacteristic by me,” said Jalen Brunson, who scored 25 points, had five turnovers and was 0-for-7 from downtown. “This one’s on me. I got to be better, and I will be better.”
It’s hard to pin this one on Brunson, especially in the final five minutes of the game. When Butler was injured, the Knicks were just trailing by three points. He was clearly having trouble moving for the final minutes and mostly lurked in the corner as a decoy three-point threat on offense and was ineffective on defense. Brunson said that the Knicks could have taken better advantage of that situation.
“He’s one of the best defenders in the league, so even if his feet aren’t moving fast side to side, he has great hands,” Brunson said. “But as a team, we got to do a better job recognizing what’s going on, especially late in the game. Like I said, it starts with me.”
Right now, Brunson and the rest of the Knicks sound determined to shake it off, which is kind of how the Milwaukee Bucks sounded after losing Game 1 of their series.
Still, there’s something so stunning about how the Heat seem to surprise teams again and again. Maybe it’s time to stop being surprised.
Barbara Barker is an award-winning columnist and features writer in the sports department at Newsday. She has covered sports in New York for more than 20 years.
