Despite the San Antonio Spurs playing without Victor Wembanyama and De’Aaron Fox, the New York Knicks could not overcome them on the road, losing in a stunning upset Wednesday night 120-105. New York now falls to 43-25 while San Antonio improves to 29-39.
The Knicks offense was dreadful
The Knicks’ offense was a complete disaster against the Spurs. Overall, on the night, they shot just 39-for-92 from the floor and 11-for-37 from beyond the arc. In the first half, they were just 4-for-22 from downtown and saw the deficit climb to 27 early in the third quarter.
New York started to get something going in the third quarter as they had cut the deficit to just eight after they went on a 22-6 run to open the second half. In that third quarter, they shot 12-for-22 from the floor and 4-for-7 from three, but their defense fell flat again down the stretch and it wasn’t enough for them to win.
Karl-Anthony Towns was the only Knicks player who seemed to have anything going on offense. He was also the only Knicks player to score more than 14 points on the night. He finished with 32 points and nine rebounds.
The Knicks defended the perimeter poorly
Along with the bad offense, the Knicks couldn’t defend the perimeter either, making for one of their worst all-around games of the season. The Spurs shot 50% from the floor and 45.7% from three, and they had six players score in double figures.
The story of the night was the performance from backup forward Sandro Mamukelashvili. In just 19 minutes of action, he scored 34 points and grabbed nine rebounds while shooting absurd clips of 13-for-14 from the floor and a perfect 7-for-7 from three. The Knicks let him get hot in the fourth quarter with 21 points to smother New York’s comeback effort.
The Knicks continued use of drop coverage in the pick-and-pop is what led to those wide-open shots for Mamukelashvili and the other Spurs players. The defense had not been an issue recently as they seemed to have things figured out on that end, but they regressed to doing the things that hurt them earlier in the season against San Antonio.
Overview
The Knicks came out with a lackadaisical effort on both ends, leading to one of their worst losses of the season. New York will try to flush it out right away, as they play in the second night of a back-to-back Thursday night against the Charlotte Hornets.