NEW YORK — All season, the New York Knicks have gone as far as Jalen Brunson could carry them.
But when Brunson had an uncharacteristically off night against the Philadelphia 76ers on Saturday at Madison Square Garden, his teammates were there to pick up the slack.
There was Josh Hart hitting a season-high four 3-pointers, including three in the final quarter. There was Brunson’s backup, Deuce McBride, going for 21 points and finishing with a game-best plus-37. And there was Mitchell Robinson coming off the bench to grab seven of New York’s 23 offensive rebounds.
They all played significant parts in New York’s playoff-opening 111-104 victory.
“It’s definitely encouraging,” said Hart, who matched Brunson with a team-high 22 points. “We’ve been on his shoulders all season. And when he struggled, that’s when we had to pick up.
“When your top dog is not playing well — not shooting well, I didn’t want to say not playing well — you need other guys to pick it up for him, and that’s what we did.”
Brunson shot just 8 for 26 from the floor, including 1 of 6 from 3-point range, to go with seven rebounds, seven assists and five turnovers.
But on a night when he and the rest of the Knicks starters finished with negatives in the plus-minus column, it was the contributions from others — and especially the bench — that allowed New York to hold home-court advantage to begin this Battle of Interstate 95.
“They played phenomenal from the start to finish,” Brunson said. “Whenever they were in they made plays. A credit to them for their preparation.”
New York’s starters struggled because Philadelphia generally was able to control the game when Joel Embiid was on the court. In his 37 minutes, Embiid had 29 points, 8 rebounds and 6 assists, and Philadelphia outscored the Knicks by 14.
In the other 11 minutes, though, it was a different story. New York won those minutes by a score of 29-8, largely powered by a bench unit featuring Bojan Bogdanovic (13 points), Robinson and McBride at the start of the second and fourth quarters.
“Well, we had another one of those second quarter starts where we didn’t guard…
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