New York didn’t save its heroics for the final minutes of the game on Thursday — it got its work out of the way in the third.
The Knicks took charge of the game — and the Eastern Conference Finals — with an 18-0 run in the third quarter, where Cleveland went scoreless for 5:30 of game time. Meanwhile, Josh Hart turned around his struggles in Game 1 to knock down five 3-pointers and score a playoff career-high 26 on Thursday night.
New York led 85-70 after three quarters, and the only question left was whether the Cavaliers had a Knicks-like comeback in them.
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They didn’t. Cleveland did make a little run, but Mike Brown called a timeout to reset his team — something Kenny Atkinson did not do in Game 1 — and New York took control again.
In the end it was a 109-93 New York win that puts it up 2-0 in the series and puts pressure on Cleveland to hold serve on their home court.
Game 3 is in Cleveland on Saturday.
With Hart hitting everything, the much-maligned Knicks starting five — Jalen Brunson, Mikal Bridges, Hart, OG Anunoby and Karl-Anthony Towns — played heavy minutes and had a +27.7 net rating for the game.
Brunson scored just two points in the first half but took charge and started to manufacture points in the third, including a pull-up 3-pointer over Dean Wade, then soon after hit a runner over Wade, plus had a steal that became a Bridges dunk in transition. Brunson finished with 19 points and 14 assists on the night.
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Bridges added 19 points and Towns scored 18.
Cleveland struggled on offense all night. Donovan Mitchell was playing through some pain and shot 8-of-18 on his way to 26 points, and James Harden didn’t pick him up (18 points on 6-of-15 shooting). Evan Mobley had 14 points in the first half but was scoreless in the second.
Like Game 1, the Cavaliers raced out to an early lead, getting up by six midway through the first quarter, in part because they started 4-of-7 from 3-point range while the Knicks were 1-of-6. At the end of one quarter, it was a 27-24 Cleveland lead, as the Knicks’ offense once again looked stuck in the mud.
That changed in the second quarter because New York became really aggressive on drives as evidenced by its 30 points in the paint. Towns led that charge with 13 points on 5-of-7 shooting because he got downhill, and Josh Hart was aggressive and had 12 first-half points.
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Then came the Knicks’ run in the third, and that was the game.
New York picked apart Cleveland’s defense on its way to a 123.9 offensive rating for the meaningful part of the game, with a 59.4 eFG%. When Cleveland started throwing double-teams at Brunson, he picked them apart with his passing, and Hart and Towns finished the plays.
Cleveland needs to find its energy from the first half of Game 1 — or, better yet, Game 7 against Detroit last series — or this Eastern Conference Finals could end quickly.
