The Knicks visit Minnesota on Thursday with perhaps the best version of Karl-Anthony Towns.
IN OCTOBERafter the New York Knicks blew a 13-point second-half lead to lose a winnable game to the Cleveland Cavaliers 110-104, the home locker room was curiously quiet.
Part of that was due to the nature of the loss; The Cavs had shown more toughness and effort to achieve victory, traits that have long defined teams coached by Tom Thibodeau. But some of the dull tones were also due to a glaring number on the stat sheet.
Karl-Anthony Townsthe shooting center acquired from the Minnesota Timberwolves at the start of training camp and with a $220 million contract, he had attempted only eight shots. When asked about Towns’ limited opportunities that night, the Knicks guard and team captain Jalen Brunson He recognized that he needed to do more to get the ball to his center.
“No matter how good Karl is, there is no way [una defensa] I took him out of a game. It’s up to us and me to make sure we’re on the same page and make sure everyone eats,” Brunson said from his corner closet. “I’ve got to get better at adapting, and I’ve got to see it.”
Even more disconcerting: The low shot total against Cleveland had become something of a trend. In his first three games as a Knick, the four-time All-Star had averaged nine shots per game, fewer than any member of the starting five, even though he had posted the best true shooting percentage of that group of five players.
It didn’t take long (two days, to be exact) for the problem to be rectified.
With Brunson looking to make the game easier, Towns lit up the Miami Heat’s top-10 defense, scoring 44 points on 17-of-25 shooting. and marking a sea change for the Knicks’ offense, which ranks third in the NBA and has seen Towns go from last on the team’s starting five in shots per game to first since the Oct. 28 loss to Cleveland. .
“Things are getting a lot easier for them than last year,” an Eastern Conference scout told ESPN of the Knicks’ 16-10 start. “We knew the spacing would be better with Towns, but I didn’t think they would be this good so quickly.”
The transformation – for New York and for Towns, who is in the midst of the best season of his career when he returns to Minnesota on Thursday (9:30 p.m. ET, TNT in the US) — raises a tantalizing question: With Towns playing so well, what is New York’s new ceiling after two straight second-round playoff exits?
THE EXPLOSIVE POTENTIAL It became evident, almost immediately. Late in the first half of the Knicks’ second game of the season, Brunson dribbled around a Towns screen and probed the right side of the court, forcing Indiana Pacers guard Andrew Nembhard and center Myles Turner to make a decision. They both followed Brunson.
But then Brunson stopped abruptly, straightened and threw a pass to Towns, who was behind and left completely unmarked. Turner tried to close the distance, but was late. His shoulders slumped as the ball sailed through the net to give the Knicks a 16-point lead as time expired in the first half. The Garden roared with joy. And Towns, who had kept his eye on the 3-point arc, stayed in place, swaggering in celebration.
This was exactly what the Knicks envisioned for this duo: a dynamic pick-and-pop ability that simply overwhelms a defense that doesn’t have the slightest idea who to stick with in the split-second pick.. Should they prioritize the sturdy point guard, who last season became the first player since Michael Jordan on putting together four straight 40-point performances in the playoffs, or should they focus on Towns, who has made 40% of his career three-pointers and has perhaps been rightly rated as the best-shooting center in basketball history?
It’s an impossible call, and on that late October night, the Pacers simply couldn’t respond as the Knicks cruised to a 25-point home victory.
The Knicks, who featured one of the league’s most stagnant and isolation-based offenses last season, now have a terrifying option.
Brunson and Towns are punishing defenses for 121 points per 100 possessions in pick-and-pop situationsand the Knicks as a team rank second in the league in such plays. They’ve made a massive 19-point improvement from last season, when Brunson and the Knicks ranked 29th in the NBA in pick-and-pop scoring efficiency.
Towns’ offensive impact extends far beyond the pick-and-pop game. The space his shot provides opens the lane for one of the NBA’s most creative finishers. It’s no coincidence that Brunson, who shot 61% at the rim two seasons ago and 63% last year, has reached 67%. On average, Brunson has had 1.25 players contest his layups and floaters this season when Towns is on the court, according to Second Spectrum tracking. To put it in context, that number jumps to 1.47 players contesting Brunson’s penetrations with Towns on the bench.
Teams can’t bring in help defenders quickly enough when Towns is on the court. That’s why New York is shooting almost 71% near the rim. “The floor will be wide open. The rim will be there,” forward Josh Hart presciently said of the Knicks’ potential space after the Towns trade.
He was right.
own Towns has taken advantage of the space in the paint, scoring 1.21 points per direct penetrationthe best mark of his career, a rate that ranks seventh in the NBA among players with 150 penetrations or more.
The metric illustrates the dilemma he presents for defenders: If you close in on him too much, you allow breakaway dunks. If you give him too much space, like Turner did, he’s also likely to end badly. Towns is shooting 52% (25 of 48) on wide-open 3-pointers so far this season.
Of course, Towns has contributed more to the Knicks than scoring ability. Fans and analysts alike feared that Towns could not replace the elite passing and rebounding of center Isaiah Hartenstein, who left for the Oklahoma City Thunder as a free agent.
But two months later, Towns has all but silenced those concerns. His teammates are shooting 55.4% off Towns’ passes, not only the highest mark on the Knicks, but one of the top 10 rates in the league among players with at least 100 assist opportunities (with Towns , New York is moving the ball much better than in recent years, when it finished last and next to last in assist percentage in 2022-23 and 2023-24, respectively; Knicks are ranked 13th this season).
“The passing has evolved a lot,” Thibodeau said of Towns last month. “He’s always been unselfish and a teamwork guy, but now I think he really sees things. He understands what the defense is trying to do.”
But the rebounds of Towns They could be the biggest revelation of all. In addition to becoming The first player since Shaquille O’Neal in 1996-97 to record 500 points and 250 rebounds in his first 20 games with a new team, Towns is grabbing an NBA-high 13.9 rebounds per game.. The 29-year-old, who grabbed 8.3 rebounds per game last season, is experiencing the NBA’s largest single-season rebound increase in more than 30 years.
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Karl-Anthony Towns with the cap against the Atlanta Hawks
Karl-Anthony Towns arrives in time to prevent the Hawks’ basket.
THEN THERE IS THE DEFENSE. During the first weeks of the season, New York, trying to add a new frontcourt defender, Mikal Bridges, and a new rim protector, Towns, could stop almost nothing. Through Nov. 10, opponents were shooting 78% on layups and dunks against Towns when he was the opposing defender, a mark that ranked last in the NBA among players with at least 50 shots defended at that time. the season.
“They were like a tourniquet,” the Eastern scout said. “Bridges was slow to get around screens and Towns got too low to hit the ball handler. That’s what happened almost every time. Teams attacked his weak spot.”
However, to the credit of Towns has limited opposing shooters to 52% on layups and dunks from November 11 onwards. That’s a tremendously encouraging sign for the Knicks as they await Mitchell Robinson’s return from ankle surgery.
That doesn’t mean there aren’t occasional growing pains. Last week, in the quarterfinals of the NBA Cup Against the Hawks, Towns got into foul trouble (something he has struggled with for a long time) and his time on the bench allowed Atlanta to dominate the glass and come back to win. They finished with 22 offensive rebounds, prompting Hawks center Clint Capela to say that the Hawks “[le quitaron el alma a los Knicks]” after eliminating New York from the tournament.
Still, with How fundamentally Towns has changed his offense, even with the initial defensive deficiencies, it’s clear why the organization felt comfortable making a high-profile trade for him.. And if Towns maintains this level of play, the move could take the team even further, to its first conference finals in 25 years.
Matt Williams of ESPN Stats & Info contributed to this story.
