Steve Popper: Champs' 0-2 start should give team strong wake-up call
New York Knicks' Karl-Anthony Towns (32) battles for a rebound against the Boston Celtics during the second half of an NBA basketball game, Friday, Oct. 23, 2026, in Boston. Credit: AP/Charles Krupa
When you pull off the greatest comeback in NBA Finals history, erasing a 29-point deficit in Game 4 last season, it gives you the faith and the knowledge that you are never out of a game.
But the problem with that is: You have to remember that you fell behind by 29 points.
For the Knicks right now, the deficit isn’t so steep or daunting, and maybe they and their fan base know after last season: Don’t head out to beat traffic.
They are 0-2 as they begin the defense of their championship. No defending champion has started this way since the 2011-12 Dallas Mavericks, but given that the last eight champions have failed to repeat, avoiding an 0-2 start really doesn’t mean anything at all.
What does matter, though, is that the Knicks have started the season with a glass of cold water thrown in their face, a wake-up call to let them know that the celebration that seemed to last all summer is over. And maybe that’s a good thing.
Even before they went to Boston, I asked Mike Brown if a performance like the season-opening loss — a night when he said the Knicks seemed as if they were running in mud — might be something a coach doesn’t mind, providing a lesson on film to shake off any ego left over from the parades of a few months ago.
He smiled and said “sometimes” with a laugh before hopping out of his chair and out the door.
The thing is, the Knicks have said the right things since arriving in camp. The opening-night loss maybe was understandable because it was an unusual night; the game was preceded by the ring ceremony and banner-raising at Madison Square Garden. The Knicks came out flat and seemed to be chasing the new-look 76ers all night long.
Maybe a little alarming was that they then went to Boston and found themselves dealing with many of the same issues on Friday. They fell behind by a dozen points; a late push brought them within a point before Jayson Tatum’s heroics ended their hopes.
Does it mean anything? Really, no. The Knicks are healthy, they are experienced and they have a really long season ahead. But they also have learned that the path back to a repeat will be a battle.
“I haven’t even looked at 50 wins or 45 or 52 or anything like that. I’m still trying to figure out this team a little bit,” Brown told reporters in Boston before the loss. “And I know everybody is like, ‘Whoa, it’s the same team as last year.’ New season, new team, new challenges, and so I’m not even sure who I want to play yet, you know? Trying to figure the little things out.”
“Obviously, you want to start off well and be the best you can be at all times,” Jalen Brunson said. “But sometimes you have to go through things to learn who you are as a team.”
What didn’t happen in both of these losses was the magic that Brunson provided so many times, otherworldly shotmaking that would push them over the top. So maybe the lesson is that they can’t afford to walk that tightrope of relying on his heroics to bail them out.
“We can’t afford to put ourselves in a position like we did last game, where we’re down and we’re trying to fight back, the usual Knicks game you saw last year,” Karl-Anthony Towns said before they fell to 0-2. “We’re just not that sharp of a team yet, at this point. It’s the first game of the year, 0-0, ring night; there’s a lot of things going on. So to put ourselves in a position like that, it’s playing with fire a lot.
“We’re not that team yet of last year at the sharpness of shooting, our offense clicking exactly how we want to and everything. It looked like the first game of the year for us. We had a lot of things to clean up, a lot of things we have to get sharper at, but the most important thing is that we continue, like I told y’all last year, to get that 1% better every single day.
“Find ways to improve each other as players, as a team, and be the best version of ourselves every single day we can possibly be. And at the end, hopefully you find that magic again.”
Rough start
Mikal Bridges played only 21 minutes Friday as he struggled through a 0-for-8 shooting night and, maybe more important, didn’t fight through some of the Celtics’ screens with enough physicality to please his coach. Bridges has shot 2-for-16 from the floor in the first two games.
“Mikal, for the most part, most of his looks, I mean, he had three or four wide-open threes,” Brown said. “And you know, obviously, we want him to make half of them if they’re open. But he’s got to keep shooting them and hopefully they’ll eventually go in sooner rather] than later.
“He’s getting the looks that he needs to get. He’s just got to knock them down now. And then he’s got to make sure that he’s physical on the defensive end — he as well as everybody else.
“Because it was all of us. [We] are laying on screens when we get hit, and when we do switch, there’s a level of physicality to the switch so that they’re able to take advantage of us.”
Deuce delivers
While Towns may be the face of the Knicks’ decision to not negotiate contract extensions right now, the more pressing contract decision might be that of Deuce McBride, the longest-tenured member of the Knicks.
He can walk away as an unrestricted free agent at season’s end and is due for a huge raise. However, to give it to him, the Knicks almost certainly would need to venture into the second apron of the salary cap, which they have been unwilling to do.
McBride put his skills on display Friday night, shooting 6-for-8 from beyond the arc, scoring 20 points off the bench and contributing hard-nosed defense that helped disrupt the Celtics’ offense. And there was the play that showed just how different he can be when healthy, which he wasn’t after undergoing a surgical procedure in February to correct a sports hernia.
He hustled to deflect a pass, nearly crashing into the front row as he saved it by hurling it behind his back to Brunson, and finished the fast break with a three-point field goal.
Steve Popper covers the Knicks for Newsday. He has spent nearly three decades covering the Knicks and the NBA, along with just about every sports team in the New York metropolitan area.
