The Magic exposed New York and found no isse in telling everybody about it.
We won’t have to wait long before we start to come to serious conclusions about the Knicks’ ongoing skid as New York takes on Toronto on Wednesday in a reunion with Immanuel Quickley and RJ Barrett.
The Magic, the last team to trounce New York’s bench—if there’s one at all—laid out how the blueprint for beating the Knicks after conquering New York on Monday in what could be understood as straight laughing-in-Thibs’-face coming from a squad that didn’t even have their four-best scorers to make it doubly damaging and embarrassing. Sheesh…
Here’s what those Magicians, Coach Thibs, and a few Knicks have said of late.
Tom Thibodeau
On the heavy schedule and the Knicks’ slump.
“We’re coming off a long road trip. But that’s the challenge of the league. Be ready every night. We’re shorthanded. When you’re shorthanded, you’ve got to play hard. Your margin of error is tight.”
On the Knicks’ late struggles from three-point range.
“It’s a hard thing, I want to look at the 3s. Some of them I felt were good [looks]. Some of them I felt there were hard close-outs and we’ve gotta read it better.
“So we can do better than we did tonight. We’ll take a look at it.”
On Mitchell Robinson’s recovery.
“He hasn’t been cleared for practice. That will probably be the next step, so just doing his rehab stuff. There’s a lot of benchmarks he has to clear and once he does that, he’ll get onto the court.”
On Towns and McBride’s status for Wednesday and Sims’ contributions in relief.
“Yup. Day-to-day, and that’s part of it, so, next guy get in there.
“I thought Jericho gave us really good minutes.”
Josh Hart
On the absence of Karl-Anthony Towns and its impact.
“Obviously it’s a huge difference. His ability to space the court, his ability to play off the catch, he really opens things up for a lot of guys.
“Him not being out there it’s a different pace, it’s a different game that we’re playing. We’ve got to recognize that and try to find ways to get easier baskets in transition, getting stops and pushing it.”
Jalen Brunson
On the Knicks’ recent shooting struggles.
“Ball’s just not going in for us, but that shouldn’t be the reason why we’re not winning games.
“We gotta find a way to impact the game in other areas when we’re not making shots like that. It starts with me.”
On the impact of fatigue and a tough on-the-road schedule on the recent losing skid.
“We can say that, but it’s not an excuse of why we lost tonight.
“We don’t say we were tired, that’s not who we are.”
On the need of other players to step up in Karl-Anthony Towns’ absence.
“Whoever is in there, it’s a next-man-up mentality. Towns obviously brings a lot to the game, but it’s unfair to the rest of the guys on the team, who put in all the work, to say without him we weren’t able to do a lot.
“We just need to come ready to play with energy, regardless of what happens.”
Mitchell Robinson
On his absence from press conferences and media availability sessions.
“It’s so amazing that y’all KNOW what happened and still fault me but wonder why I act the way I act. All love tho.”
Mikal Bridges
On the Knicks’ poor shooting performances lately.
“I don’t know [the reason], we just gotta keep shooting them and stay with it. Keep trusting.
“Everybody’s in the gym, so I don’t think we’re really looking at it like that. I think [the Magic] just played harder than us.”
Kentavious Caldwell-Pope (Orlando Magic Player)
On taking advantage of the Knicks’ thin rotation and fatigue.
“We kind of already know Thibs is one of them coaches that plays his players until the buzzer ends.
“We kind of know that from previous coaching, other teams, stuff like that.”
On exploiting the Knicks’ lack of depth and anticipating the final outcome.
“Playing 48 minutes, you’re getting screened, you’re getting hit. We’re pushing the pace—all those are factors—and once we see you get tired, we’ve done our job. Now it’s time for us to get [the offense] going.
“We’re one of the most well-conditioned teams in the league. We thrive on that.
“This was a back-to-back for us, and no one looked tired.”
On how the Magic handle their minutes and rotations.
“Coach Mose always tells us, ‘Play til you get tired, then raise your hand,’ and we did that tonight.
“We’re subbing guys in and out. We play until we get tired. That’s one of our key game plans.”
Anthony Black (Orlando Magic Player)
On the Knicks’ rotation and the Magic’s approach.
“Those dudes play super hard. Honestly, they play a lot of minutes. Yeah… other teams know that, of course.”