Knicks bounce back vs. Pacers in Karl-Anthony Towns’ MSG debut

NEW YORK — The New York Knicks bought obliterated Tuesday of their season opener, achieved in by a deluge of Boston Celtics triples. An NBA record-tying 29 of them, to be precise.

That style was nonetheless within the Knicks’ mouths once they took the ground for his or her house opener Friday evening, and the membership used it as gas to drill the Indiana Pacers 123-98 in Karl-Anthony Cities and Mikal Bridges’s house debut at Madison Sq. Backyard.

“Everytime you get your butt kicked on nationwide TV within the NBA, it means you need to step it up,” mentioned wing Josh Hart, considered one of 4 New York starters to complete with 20 or extra factors towards Indiana. Bridges and Cities had 21 apiece, whereas flooring basic Jalen Brunson completed with a game-high 26.

“I beloved the best way our guys responded,” Knicks coach Tom Thibodeau mentioned. “The combat we confirmed was quite a bit better.”

The outcome was a satisfying one for the Knicks, who, other than shifting previous the embarrassing loss to Boston, have been additionally searching for revenge for final season’s Sport 7 loss to the Pacers (1-1) on the Backyard within the Japanese Convention semifinals.

The reversal from the Knicks’ season-opening loss was most obvious on the defensive finish. In Boston, the Knicks struggled mightily to defend the perimeter. On Friday, New York held the Pacers — the league’s second-best offense final season — to 3-of-30 from the arc.

Particularly, the Knicks’ wings have been aggressive with Indiana star Tyrese Haliburton, holding him scoreless on eight photographs.

“I simply was dangerous, bro. It occurs,” Haliburton mentioned.

Bridges began the sport on Haliburton defensively earlier than giving solution to Hart and OG Anunoby for a handful of possessions at a time. The Knicks (1-1) bought out in transition plenty of instances following Pacers turnovers, scoring 29 factors off Indiana’s 14 miscues throughout the contest.

The Backyard crowd was energetic from the bounce, lighting as much as help Cities — an area product from suburban New Jersey — and Bridges for his or her first significant motion on the house flooring. The sport was roughly over halfway by way of the third, when New York pulled forward by 30 factors. However followers have been nonetheless rowdy by then due to the not solely Knicks but in addition the New York Yankees, who have been taking part in in Sport 1 of the World Collection.

A large “Let’s Go Yankees!” chant broke out within the fourth quarter after Giancarlo Stanton hit a two-run homer to place the Yanks up 2-1, after which the mantra was repeated as soon as Stanton’s shot was proven on the sector’s video display screen. Cities was among the many followers doing so, and began waving his towel wildly as he watched the play unfold.

“Oh, I used to be trying up [at the jumbotron] for certain,” mentioned Cities, a Yankees fan who watched the sport — which was ended by the Los Angeles Dodgers’ Freddie Freeman with a walk-off grand slam — intently within the locker room as he was doing his postgame interview.