The Knicks demolished the Wiz Kiz on Sunday, capping a week that has New York just half-a-game behind Boston in the standings.
On top of that, Tyler Kolek made history, scoring 53 points on a single day playing for two professional teams in New York and Westchester.
Here’s the latest from your favorite people in the NBA universe.
Mike Brown
On his preferred playoff rotation depth:
“For me, I like to play 9 or 9.5 guys — 10 if you can. It gets hard because we have guys on our roster willing to play 34 minutes. When you have multiple guys, four or five guys, who are worthy of that, it makes it a little harder to give other guys extended minutes. I’ve felt we’ve tried to do a good job of giving our young guys an opportunity to play and other guys an opportunity to play.”
On keeping rotational players ready:
“Being with Steve Kerr, one of the things they used to do is start someone different every once in a while, someone who might not have played in three or four games. The only rhyme or reason they did it is to let them know that they have to be ready. Your number can be called at anytime. I liked that, but I didn’t go quite that route. I do like the fact that guys can think, ‘Oh, OK. My number can be called at any time, so I have to stay ready.’ It’s not just lip service. It can happen because they saw it happen. I threw Diawara out there a couple of times as a rookie. Doing that keeps guys engaged and on their toes, especially when guys are handling their minutes as professionals, which all of our guys have done.”
On the improved start to the game against Washington:
“We talked about it. Our biggest thing is making our opponent feel us and we did a better job in that area. I thought we did a nice job moving the ball and trying to take the right shots. I thought overall, it was a lot better than what we’ve done in a couple of games.”
On avoiding overreaction to bad game stretches:
“There was a time when we were struggling, I think in the third quarter, coming out of halftime. Two games ago, we were great. Against Indiana, we were great. I’m not gonna lie, I don’t remember who we played before that. Against Golden State, we stunk. I don’t know who we played before that. So you try to prepare your guys and not overreact to struggles that you may have that could be short-term or temporary. So we’re not to a point where I’m gonna try to do something out of the box with the guys. They are a veteran group and like I said, we’ve struggled in other areas throughout the course of the year before. So I’m gonna keep doing what we’re doing and in due time, if we need to change this or change that I’m definitely not opposed to it, as all you guys know, from our players to our staff, I’m not opposed to somebody else saying ‘hey, let’s do this instead of that.’”
On seeding and home-court advantage:
“The higher the seed, the better, mainly because the fans at MSG are awesome and playing in this environment during that time, you couldn’t ask for anything better. But at the end of the day, if we truly believe that we are THAT team, it truly don’t matter where we got to go and who we got to face.”
Jalen Brunson
On playing the Knicks way early against the Wizards:
“I think we came out and we played our style. They had a decent run where they tied the game back up, but after that we got the lead, played well with the lead and didn’t look back after that.”
On Jose Alvarado’s bench energy:
“It helps the team no matter what. You kind of wish he was on the court, because he’s a little bit quieter than on the bench. He does so much for this team on and off the court. It’s constant energy. Kind of regardless of how he’s playing, he always has the energy. That’s a skill, that’s a skill that makes someone last in the league a long time. It’s great to have him.”
Josh Hart
On the comparisons to Andre Iguodala:
“Andre is extremely talented, definitely was a better player in this league than I am. But we can be like an older version of Andre. Older, less athletic, scoring version of Andre. But it’s cool, Andre is someone who is highly respected for everything he’s done for the game. So it was cool.”
On finding pride in doing the dirty work and connecting his teammates:
“I take a lot of pride in it. Especially right now, you just look at numbers and you don’t understand the process of the game. A lot of people think you can just throw five guys in that score X amount of points, and that’s how it’s gonna be. But that’s not always what it is, situations are different. So for me, especially in that starting group, I’m a guy that’s gonna connect the dots, a guy that’s gonna try to be unselfish, get other guys involved, get other guys flowing in good rhythm. I think that gets overlooked, but for me, I take pride in it.”
Mitchell Robinson
On the need to have better starts after the Brooklyn scare:
“We just got to come in ready to go. We can’t take that one like we did this one to start the game. Come out and be prepared to go on Sunday.”
Mikal Bridges
On needing better team starts after escaping the Nets game alive:
“We just got to come out better. That’s pretty much it. We got to be better as a team.”
Jose Alvarado
On the MSG introduction when he started with Brunson out:
“It’s really emotional. If you watched the video of me when they said the starting five and they said me, I pointed to my parents. It’s just something I know where they sit at, I’m always going to look for them and it’s just cool to have them at the game all the time now. New Orleans was pretty tough because they lived out here. So now they can come to every game they want.”
On playing in Brooklyn as a Knick:
“It’s cool. It’s just cool all the time to play with a Knicks jersey on. But obviously playing at Brooklyn, playing against Brooklyn pretty special. Being a kid from down the street, I was raised probably 10 minutes down the street from Barclays Center. It got expensive. My grandma still lives there, my dad’s mom. She lives in the projects right there down the street from Fort Greene. She still lives there. So me and my dad, we go visit. We could walk there. I just remember it being a train station. Obviously, it got developed to a nice city area.”
On not imagining playing for the Knicks:
“I didn’t really think of it like that. I didn’t think none of this. I didn’t think I was going to be playing for the Knicks.”
On energy becoming his NBA skill:
“I didn’t think that growing up. But as I got closer, into college and going into my NBA career, it keeps me in the NBA. That’s one of the reasons I got to the NBA and it separates me from being just in the NBA if that makes sense. I just figured out that’s what God blessed me with, and I’ve just got to do it at a high level.”
On Brunson and Hart teasing him:
“They headaches. They’re good people. They’re great guys. We’ve just got a relationship, they think they can say whatever. But it’s all love and fun. Those guys are great.”
