The Knicks won Game 1 of the NBA Finals on Wednesday night. They might have lost a lot more in the process.
Jalen Brunson exited in the first quarter after a freak collision under the basket. Harrison Barnes went up for a rebound, got shoved from behind by Landry Shamet, and tumbled awkwardly into Brunson’s right knee. Brunson immediately grabbed his leg, hobbled to the bench, and was helped back to the locker room shortly after.
Here is the part nobody wants to talk about. Brunson actually came back. He returned in the second half and dropped 30 points in the win. He scored 13 in the fourth quarter and looked like the same guy who has carried New York through three rounds of basketball. But the way he was favoring that knee between quarters and during dead balls told a different story.
The Knicks have not put out a formal update. Tom Thibodeau said after the game that Brunson would get imaging Thursday and that the team would have more clarity by Friday. That is coach-speak for “we have no idea how bad this is yet.” Anyone who has watched a Thibodeau team for the last decade knows the guy is not going to volunteer injury information.
Brunson is the engine. He averaged 26.0 points per game in the regular season and 26.9 in the playoffs. He is the offense in late-game situations. The Knicks do not have a credible bailout option if he cannot play, because Karl-Anthony Towns is not built for primary creator duty in a Finals series and Mikal Bridges has been more of a complementary scorer all year.
The good news is that Brunson is famously durable and famously tough. This is the same guy who played 47 playoff games last spring on what he later admitted was a sore foot. He played through a broken hand against the Pacers two years ago. He is not going to volunteer to sit unless the doctors tell him there is no other option.
The bad news is that knees are knees. A guy can play through a broken hand or a sore ankle in a way he cannot play through a structural knee issue. The Knicks need an MRI to confirm there is no ligament damage, no meniscus issue, no anything that requires more than a few days of treatment.
The Spurs cannot be happy about how this looked. Wembanyama and company want to win this series straight up against a healthy New York team. There is no glory in stealing a series because your opponent’s MVP-level guard tore something in the first quarter of Game 1. Mitch Johnson said postgame that he hoped Brunson was okay, and you could tell he meant it.
If Brunson is out, the Knicks rotation looks completely different. Cam Payne moves into the starting lineup. Bridges has to handle ball-handling duty for stretches. Towns becomes the offensive focal point. The defense actually gets better because Brunson is the weakest perimeter defender New York puts on the floor, but the offensive ceiling drops dramatically.
If he plays through it, the Knicks are still favorites to take this series. If he misses any time at all, the Spurs are flying back to San Antonio knowing they have a real chance to take Game 2 on the road and steal home court.
Friday is going to feel like an eternity for every Knicks fan watching the practice reports.
A longtime sports reporter, Carlos Garcia has written about some of the biggest and most notable athletic events of the last 5 years. He has been credentialed to cover MLS, NBA and MLB games all over the United States. His work has been published on Fox Sports, Bleacher Report, AOL and the Washington Post.
