On a day when the most important actions impacting the Knicks’ season happened off the court, the eight men of New York put up a respectable effort, but the Dallas Mavericks never trailed en route to a 122-108 win at Madison Square Garden on Thursday night.
The Knicks fell to fell to 33-19 on the year, but will remain in the fourth spot in the Eastern Conference. The Mavs improved to 29-23.
Here are the takeaways...
- The Knicks were without Jalen Brunson, Julius Randle and OG Anunoby – the last of whom will be out at least three weeks after undergoing surgery – and were further hampered by a trade deadline deal that sent three reserves to Detroit.
And with Alec Burks and Bojan Bogdanovic not yet arrived in New York, Tom Thibodeau was forced into starting Miles McBride, Josh Hart, Donte DiVincenzo, Precious Achiuwa and Isaiah Hartenstein. And with just three players available on the bench.
- The home side admirably kept it close through the first seven minutes as the defense remained stingy despite the lack of normal starters and the pace was advantageous as they stymied the Mavericks' offense into contested shots and one-and-done possessions.
But, that only lasted for so long. When youngster Charlie Brown Jr. and veteran Taj Gibson were the first to emerge off the bench, the discrepancy in talent really started to show, especially on the Knicks’ offensive end. Dallas’ first quarter lead was just six points despite holding the Knicks to 10-for-24 shooting with four turnovers, as the Knicks held them to 2-of-9 from three.
The pace benefited New York, and Thibodeau did his best using four timeouts and a challenge in the opening half to give his players extra rest. But circumstance had worked against the eight-man outfit.
- The Knicks’ lack of any shot creators continued to hurt the Knicks in the second and were relying quite a bit on DiVincenzo to create off the dribble, find his own shot and find open teammates. At the half, he had 16 points on 6-for-14 shooting (4-for-6 from three) but had just one assist and outside of 10 points from Hartenstein, there was little consistent offense for New York.
At the half Luka Doncic had 12 points, eight assists and five rebounds as he started to turn the screw after a low-scoring first and Dallas had a 59-48 advantage at the interval.
- At the start of the third quarter, Hartenstein, who was seen limping after an and-1 in the first half, did not emerge from the locker room and was soon ruled out for the remainder of the game due to a sore left Achilles tendon. He finished with 10 points, four rebounds, two assists and two steals in 15 first-half minutes.
Hart scored eight points in the early goings of the third quarter to keep things from getting out of hand immediately, but the Mavs took a nine-point edge and increased it to 18 in just under two minutes and forced Thibs to call his penultimate timeout of the game.
- In the fourth quarter, the defensive struggle gave way to a series of haymakers in the form of deep threes. Doncic made threes from very deep range, only for the Knicks to respond with two threes each from DiVincenzo and Hart.
New York made 10-of-15 shots to open the quarter, but the Mavs were 8-of-11 and the lead was still 10 with 4:35 to play after three free throws from DiVincenzo.
The lead would get to just eight a minute later, but a 10-2 Mavs run capped by yet another deep Doncic three ended the contest.
“I thought we did some good things,” Thibodeau said after the game. “We had a tough stretch in the third, but then I liked the way we fought back in the fourth.”
- Hart would finish with a triple-double, 23 points (on 8-for-22 shooting), 12 assists and 10 rebounds in 39 minutes. DiVincenzo scored 36 points on 13-for-26 (7-for-12 from behind the arc) with three assists and two rebounds in 43 minutes.
Doncic had 39 points on 12-for-23 (6-for-13 from three) with 11 assists, eight rebounds and four steals in 40 minutes. Kyrie Irving added 16 points, five rebounds and five assists in a co-starring role for the visitors.
- Jacob Toppin, the eighth Knick to feature, logged 11 minutes in his longest-ever career outing and recorded his first NBA points on a put-back dunk late in the fourth quarter.
- Spencer Dinwiddie was spotted in the Madison Square Garden crowd just hours after the Brooklyn Nets traded him to the Toronto Raptors. He could be a buyout candidate and could potentially fit with Dallas.
