Knicks need to give their fans something to get excited about in Game 4
New York Knicks' Jalen Brunson reacts during the second half of Game 3 of an NBA basketball second-round playoff series against the Boston Celtics, Saturday, May 10, 2025, in New York. Credit: AP/Pamela Smith
We had all seen the Knicks pull off the impossible in the first two games of this Eastern Conference semifinal series. We had seen them battle back from 20 points down in each game and then outplay the defending champion Boston Celtics in the final seconds.
The Knicks had gone into enemy territory and exited triumphantly, and the city couldn’t wait to celebrate them on Saturday at Madison Square Garden, where the average resale ticket price had jumped to close to $2,000.
Well, it turns out we all got a little giddy a little too soon. That includes the Knicks, who played their worst game of the playoffs on a day when some fans had forked over a week’s take-home salary hoping to see their best. Any hopes of watching the Knicks take a 3-0 lead were quickly buried in a barrage of three-pointers as the Celtics dominated the Knicks, 115-93, in Game 3.
“We need to play with more of a sense of urgency,” Jalen Brunson said. “I don’t think we came in with the mindset of being satisfied, but I think it was subconsciously satisfied after being up 2-0. That’s not what we need to approach the game.”
In this year’s playoffs, the Knicks are 5-0 on the road and 1-3 at the Garden. Weird, maybe. It ought to be easier to play in a place where everyone has your back. But that hasn’t been the case in the second round of the playoffs.
All four of the home teams lost Game 1 in the Eastern Conference semifinals. Cleveland, the top seed in the Eastern Conference, lost its first two games at home before beating Indiana on the road Friday night.
Still, the way the Knicks lost on Saturday was shocking. Until this game, they had not been involved in a playoff game that was won by more than 11 points. The Celtics had an 11-point lead midway through the first quarter, led by 20 midway through the second, went up 31 and never took the foot off the accelerator.
The Knicks had gone 0-4 against the Celtics in the regular season, with the first three results being Boston blowouts. After the first two games of this series, it looked as if the Knicks had found a way to crack the code. They had frustrated the Celtics’ outside shooters, managed to chip away at big leads and come up with huge plays down the stretch.
Instead of clutch plays down the stretch, the Knicks had the subs in at the end of this loss. For Mikal Bridges, a star in Boston after coming up with huge defensive plays at the end of both wins, it was a tough thing to watch.
“The fans deserve better,” Bridges said. “We should win more games at home, obviously. It’s good to be a good road team, but it should be easier for us at home.”
The Knicks often seem to play their best when their backs are against the wall. In this game, oddly, it was the defending champions who were feeling the heat for losing twice to a team that many thought they were capable of sweeping.
Jayson Tatum and Celtics coach Joe Mazzulla were under the microscope for not getting the job done late in games, and Mazzulla said it had not been an easy couple of days since the Celtics lost Game 2.
“You just have to tap into your darkness,” he said when asked how the team had dealt with the pressure.
Tatum, who scored only 13 points in Game 2, had 22 points and shot 5-for-9 from three-point range in Game 3. The Celtics shot 20-for-40 from outside the arc, with Payton Pritchard coming off the bench to go 5-for-10.
“Home court is important. Being great in front of our fans is important,” Tatum said. “You know how much we value their support. But at the same time, if you want to be special, if you want to be great, you’ve got to win some games on the road.
“It’s just about responding. We want to be perfect. We want to win every game. But that’s not going to happen. But how you respond to those moments is equally important as well.”
It’s now the Knicks’ turn to respond. The city has embraced them these last three days in a way they hadn’t in years. No one wants the party to be over.
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.
