The Knicks, playing without a single starter and several key reserves, got worked over by the Washington Wizards, 120-103, for their first preseason loss of the year on Monday night at Madison Square Garden.
In their fourth preseason game of the year, the Knicks decided to sit Jalen Brunson, Karl-Anthony Towns, OG Anunoby, Mikal Bridges, Josh Hart, Ariel Hukporti, Mitchell Robinson, and Landry Shamet. Head coach Mike Brown said before the game that he intended to start Hukporti and play Shamet, who is one of three veteran players on a non-guaranteed contract fighting for one roster spot, but both were ruled out due to illness.
In their place, Malcolm Brogdon, Deuce McBride, Jordan Clarkson, Pacome Dadiet, and Guerschon Yabusele went out as the starting five with the plan to give the players of the second unit and those on the roster bubble an extended run.
“I thought our starters did not bring the energy,” Brown said after the game. “This is probably our worst basketball game overall. We did it in spurts: we weren’t very good to start the game, we weren’t very good to start the third quarter.”
Washington capitalized by shooting the lights out, 68.3 percent in the first half and 53.7 percent for the game. New York made up for the lack of defensive production with a rough shooting night, 41.9 percent in the first half and 44.4 percent for the game.
The plus-minus for the starting five was not pretty: Clarkson minus-29 in 21 minutes, Dadiet minus-20 in 24 minutes, Yabusele minus-33 in 23 minutes, Brogdon minus-30 in 18 minutes, McBride minus-26 in 28 minutes.
But, always the teacher, there was a positive to take from a game that didn't go their way.
“Great film to learn from because we made a lot of mistakes that have been uncharacteristic of who we've been so far, even in practice, we've played a lot better than this in terms of what we’re trying to do offensively and defensively,” Brown said. “Great learning experience, we’ll all grow from it, and, hopefully take that step forward instead of just thinking we took a step backwards because we didn’t play well tonight.
Here are the takeaways...
- Dadiet took advantage of some good early looks, knocking down a pair of early threes. There were a few times when the 20-year-old looked a bit lost on the defensive end. He finished with eight points on 2-for-7 shooting (2-for-6 from deep) with six rebounds (two offensive).
Ahead of the game, Brown highlighted how the Knicks are going to look for opportunities this year to get Dadiet time as they really like his upside.
"He's just gotta continue to understand how big he is," Brown said. "He's long. He's a big wing. And at times, he doesn't utilize it. We always talk about playing big, playing big, playing big. And he doesn’t utilize it all the time. And that’s just being young. At times, he’s a little quiet and he’s a little unsure of what he should be saying or doing.
"So we keep trying to throw him into the fire as much as possible. It’s something that I’d like to do come regular season. I don’t know how many minutes he’s gonna get per game. But he definitely has a chance to be a player in this league for a long time, and you wanna help try to speed that development up because you see a lot of good things.
"You see he can run, you see he can cut, he’s big… you see he does a petty good job of finishing and shoot the basketball. And you couple that with his ability to play defense, and you have a pretty good young prospect, especially for his age.”
- An area of concern: The Wizards were able to get good looks and forced an early timeout by Brown. The defense is still a work in progress for this bunch of Knicks as they learn the new head coach’s system and Washington took advantage, connecting on 65 percent from the floor (13 of 20) in the first quarter for a 36-26 lead. That continued in the second, with the visitors making seven of their next 10 field goals en route to shooting 71.4 percent in the period (15 of 21 and 5 of 9 from three) for a 75-52 halftime edge. Naturally, the Wizards opened the third with an 11-0 run on their way to building a 34-point lead at one point before the Knicks clawed their way back to a more respectable deficit.
- Clarkson connected on three of his first five attempts (2-for-4 from three) in the first. He led the Knicks with 10 first-half points (4-for-7 shooting) and should have had a few assists if some open looks had gone down. It wasn't a great shooting night from deep, 7-for-24 (29.2 percent) in the first half and 6-for-18 (33.3 percent) after the interval. Clarkson finished with 12 points on 4-for-11 shooting (2-for-5 from deep) with one rebound, four turnovers, and zero assists.
Brown said the Wizards didn’t do anything “tricky,” they were “just in the right spot defensively.”
“They tried to play the way that we’ve been playing throughout the preseason, every day in practice and it showed at times to be very good basketball,” he said, adding that overall, it wasn’t good enough. “We needed to do better collectively as a unit when it came to doing the little things, starting with boxing out we weren’t great at it. Defensively, we weren't great in our shifts, and we’d been pretty darn good in those two area so far.”
- One of the culprits hurting Clarkson's assist numbers was McBride, who was 1-for-5 in the first half, missing all four of his attempts from three, with two turnovers and two fouls in the first half. McBride found his range at the start of the fourth with consecutive threes to cut the deficit to 19. He finished with 11 points on 4-for-12 shooting (2-for-9 from three) with two assists and a rebound.
- Brogdon, another one of the three vets on a non-guaranteed deal, got off to a cold start shooting (2-for-7 from the floor) in the first and committed three fouls; he did add three assists. He appeared a step slow on the offensive end. His night ended with four points on 2-for-7 shooting with three assists, two rebounds, and a steal.
- Yabusele made his first three of the preseason in the first to go along with two assists in the early goings, and showed off a jump hook in the second. The new Knick made another three midway into the third, just the team’s second field goal out of their first 12 attempts of the quarter, which cut it to a 30-point deficit. He ended with 11 points on 4-for-8 shooting with five rebounds (four offensive) and two assists.
- Tyler Kolek had a solid second quarter with seven points, three assists, and a steal. He had a nice run of three straight buckets to end the third, cutting the deficit to 100-75. Kolek finished with a team-high 20 points on 7-for-13 shooting (1-for-5 from three) with six assists, four rebounds, and a steal. He finished a plus-10.
“I thought the guys coming off the bench, they did a great job, Tyler gave us great minutes," Brown said.
- Trey Jemison III added nine points with four rebounds and was a plus-11 in 15 minutes. Tosan Evbuomwan had seven points and four rebounds and was a plus-17 in 15 minutes.
Highlights
What's next
The Knicks conclude their preseason slate with a Friday night tilt against the Charlotte Hornets at MSG. Tip is set for 7:30 before New York opens the regular season on Oct. 22.
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