Some Knicks fans were heading for the exits in the final minutes, moving briskly down an escalator, when an usher asked them with a straight face why they were leaving with the game still in doubt. These were men and women who knew how this movie was going to end, and who could tell that only one team — not the home team — had come to play on this night.
These Toronto Raptors are hardly the Toronto Raptors who won the 2019 NBA title, but they are a well-coached team that understands that even in the early stages of a rebuild, intensity, length and bouncy athleticism can go a long way in this league, especially when the opponent seems intent on catching the second half of the Giants-Chiefs game.
“They just played harder than us, honestly,” said RJ Barrett, who led the Knicks with 27 points in this dispiriting 113-104 defeat. “Most of the time the hardest-playing team is going to win.”
Tom Thibodeau’s team has historically been the hardest-playing team around, but his Knicks were beaten 18 different ways Monday night, and that’s why some otherwise loyal customers got an early jump out of there to see if Eli and Peyton Manning had anything interesting to say about Daniel Jones and Patrick Mahomes.
For the second time in four home games, the Knicks allowed a lesser opponent to escape the Garden with a victory. Though this loss to Toronto was a lot more forgivable than the one to Orlando, it hurt all the same. Yeah, it’s only early November, but these defeats show up in April when home-court advantage is decided in the first round of the playoffs.
Last year’s Knicks weren’t talented enough to win a series with home-court advantage, and this year’s Knicks likely aren’t talented enough to win a series without home-court advantage.
In fact, the Knicks aren’t talented enough to win regular-season games when they are being outscored 21-3 in fast-break points, and when their opponents are taking 23 more shots than they’re taking, and when those opponents are stealing the ball from them a dozen times.
“We got back on our heels,” Thibodeau said. “They were the aggressors. That’s basically the story of the game.”
Though the Knicks and Raptors each entered with three-game winning streaks, this wasn’t supposed to be a fair fight. The visitors were playing without Scottie Barnes and, of course, Pascal Siakam. They were not expected to have enough firepower to shred the Knicks’ defense, and yet that’s exactly what they did.
That defense? “It wasn’t good,” Julius Randle said. His offense wasn’t much better. Randle dominated the first quarter, scoring 18 points on what felt like a sure 40-point night for him. And yet he only scored four points in the final 36 minutes, without offering much in the way of an explanation afterward.
Knicks fans tried to supply some early energy on a downer Monday night, but their Obi Toppin chants weren’t delivered with the same gusto as Sunday’s Mike White chants at MetLife. The home team was blitzed in the third quarter, 38-22, as Toronto made a dizzying array of 3s, and when Barrett tried to punch back late, the deficit was too much to overcome.
“They came out today and they took it to us,” he said of the Raptors. “When we get outplayed, outworked, it’s not a good feeling. That’s something that we hang our hat on, to come out and outwork everybody.”
It was a shame, too, because everyone was raving about Barrett’s commitment to his craft before this game. He’d just dropped 35 points on a Pelicans team playing without his good friend and Duke teammate Zion Williamson, and at age 21, coaches past and present were lining up to praise his maturity and approach.
Thibodeau: “He’s got a great work ethic. Those type of guys always get better. … And he has a lot of pride in what he’s doing. He’s put a lot of time into his shooting, into his defense, into finishing.”
Raptors coach Nick Nurse, who has Barrett on his Canadian national team: “Certainly all the work he’s put in this summer is paying off. He looks fabulous out there.”
But Monday night, the one fabulous player on the floor was scoring 36 points for Nurse. His name is OG Anunoby, and he tore the Knicks apart.
On his way off the floor, Thibodeau shouted at one of the refs. Only this game wasn’t defined by the officials. It was defined by a Knicks team that decided, for some reason, not to impose their considerable will on the inferior and undermanned Raptors.
“I believe in the character of this team,” Thibodeau said. “We’ve got great character.”
That character took the night off. And when that happens, these Knicks do not have the talent to make up the difference.