For most of the past five months, the Knicks have played well in spite of their starting lineup.
The starting five’s net rating from Jan. 1 to the end of the regular season was minus-1.4. But the Knicks went 28-21 in that span and finished the year with 51 wins.
In their first two playoff series, the Knicks’ starting five was outscored by a combined 21 points. But the team executed when it mattered against the Pistons and came back from 20-point deficits twice against Boston en route to the Eastern Conference Finals.
The Knicks haven’t been able to mask the starting five issue against the Pacers. Indiana has abused New York’s starting five in the first two games of this series. The Pacers have outscored the lineup by a combined 29 points. The Knicks lost the first two games of the series by a combined eight points.
Knicks head coach Tom Thibodeau is never going to tip his hand to the media. So his answers to questions about the Knicks starting five aren’t exactly brimming with insight.
“We’ve just got to keep looking at it, just got to be better,” Thibodeau said late Friday night after New York’s Game 2 loss.
The starters trailed Indiana by 10 points just seven minutes into the first quarter. Robinson and McBride entered off the bench and helped erase the Pacers’ lead.
The starting five was a minus-6 to open the second half. So it was outscored by a combined 16 points to start the first quarter and second half.
What is the prevailing issue?
“I think we just have to talk to each other off the jump,” said Mikal Bridges. “I think maybe we just play a little too soft in the beginning. I’m not sure.”
FRIED IN FOURTH
The starting five’s struggles weren’t the only reason why the Knicks lost Game 2.
They started the fourth quarter with their double-big lineup, featuring Karl-Anthony Towns and Robinson with Cam Payne at point guard. That group was outscored by nine points in the first three minutes of the quarter. A tie game turned into a nine-point Pacer lead by the time Jalen Brunson checked back in.
Thibodeau went away from Towns for a 6:30 stretch of the fourth, which tells you what he thought of his center’s play against Indiana.
In all, the Knicks were outscored by 20 with Towns on the floor in Game 2. I don’t like using single-game plus/minus as to assess a player because it can be misleading. But the team’s struggles on defense were apparent during Towns’ minutes.
After the loss, Hart was asked for his thoughts on what New York needed from Towns.
“We need him to be aggressive offensively. We need him to be locked in and communicate defensively,” Hart said. “That’s all we need from him. We need him to communicate at a high level. Offensively, be aggressive, get to his spots, get deep post position, and use his talent offensively. Defensively, be locked in, communicate at a high level and be an anchor for us.”
MORE MITCH OR MCBRIDE?
Thibodeau played McBride and Robinson for the majority of the first half. New York outscored Indiana by 10-plus points when one of those players was on the floor.
McBride was less effective later in the game and Robinson seemed to tire late in the fourth quarter. But it’s hard to ignore their total impact on the game. They made up for the starters’ poor first quarter. It was telling to me that when Hart was asked about Robinson, he mentioned that Robinson should be playing more often.
“Man, he’s huge. He’s someone who does just everything. Offensive rebound, defensive rebound, he can guard on the perimeter, guard in the post. He’s a big X factor for us,” Hart said. “We have to figure out ways — I think he played 30 minutes — figure out ways if he can play more. We’re great with him on. We all got to be willing to sacrifice for the betterment of the team.”
The Knicks obviously face long odds to win the series. Only six of the 82 teams to trail a conference finals 0-2 came back to win. New York’s comeback will have to start on Sunday in Indiana. Tipoff is at 8 p.m. If Thibodeau decides to go with the same starting five and it produces the same result, the second-guessing of the coach will only grow louder.
Pascal Siakam joined the Pacers last year [Getty Images]
Pascal Siakam scored 39 points as the Indiana Pacers beat the New York Knicks 114-109 to go 2-0 up in the NBA Eastern Conference play-off finals.
The three-time All-Star scored the Pacers’ first 11 points at Madison Square Garden as they claimed their sixth consecutive play-off win away from home.
Game three in the best-of-seven series takes place in Indianapolis at 01:00 BST on Monday.
“I just came out aggressive,” said Siakam, who has averaged more than 20 points in six consecutive seasons and won the NBA title with the Toronto Raptors in 2019.
“We’re a team. It doesn’t matter who scores. That’s what I love so much about this team.
“I got it going early and the guys did a good job of finding me. Another night, it will be somebody else. That’s what makes us special.”
Myles Turner scored 16 points and Tyrese Haliburton added 14 points, 11 assists and eight rebounds.
The fourth-seeded Pacers led by 10 points with two minutes 25 seconds left, but two free throws from OG Anunoby, five points from Jalen Brunson and a Josh Hart lay-up with 14 seconds left brought the Knicks to within one point at 110-109.
But Aaron Nesmith and Turner scored two free throws apiece for the Pacers to secure victory.
Brunson finished with 36 points to set a Knicks post-season record of 19 30-point games, while Karl-Anthony Towns and Mikal Bridges both scored 20 points and made seven rebounds.
Bridges said: “I know it is 2-0 but it is still a long series. We just have to find different ways to advance.”
The Oklahoma City Thunder lead the Minnesota Timberwolves 2-0 in the Western Conference finals.
The winners of each conference finals will meet in the NBA Finals from 5-22 June.
NEW YORK — If you find yourself in a hole, you should probably stop digging.
The New York Knicks are in the Eastern Conference finals for the first time since 2000. They won 51 games this season — the most any Knicks team has won since 2011-12. They’ve won 50-plus in consecutive seasons for the first time since the 1993-94 and 1994-95 campaigns. On Friday, point guard Jalen Brunson and center Karl-Anthony Towns were both named to the All-NBA team — just the fifth time in franchise history two Knicks earned selections in the same year.
This has been, by virtually any measuring stick, the franchise’s best season in a quarter-century. The Knicks have gotten this far. Might as well stick with what got you here, right?
“We’re just putting ourselves in a deficit, and I told you how we can’t keep doing that,” Towns said Friday. “It’s not every time we’re gonna be able to fight back and find ourselves with a win, so, you know, just gotta execute and be more disciplined.”
The Pacers made life tough for Karl-Anthony Towns in Game 2 of the Eastern Conference finals on Friday night. (Photo by Elsa/Getty Images)
Elsa via Getty Images
And after Friday’s 114-109 loss to Indiana — a defeat that earned the visiting Pacers a road sweep at Madison Square Garden, and with it, total control of the best-of-seven series — the first five has been outscored by 29 points in just 43 minutes against Rick Carlisle’s club.
“Yeah, we just gotta keep looking at it,” Thibodeau said after the loss. “Gotta do better.”
Asked a follow-up question about whether, down 2-0, the time had come to more strongly consider a change, Thibodeau brusquely replied, “We always look at everything.”
Thibodeau has fielded plenty of questions about the struggles of the starting lineup — about the inability to find consistent answers when teams cross-match their centers onto Hart and wings onto Towns, about whether swapping either more shooting (in the form of guard Miles McBride) or more size and paint protection (in the form of center Mitchell Robinson) in for Hart might better balance the group, about whether the current structure best maximizes the offensive production of Bridges and Anunoby, etc. He’s stayed the course, though, insisting before Game 2 that no matter how grim the plus-minus numbers seemed, he didn’t view them through that simple of a lens.
“It’s hard to just look at it that way,” he said. “There’s a lot of mixing and matching. Sometimes they’re with the second unit, as well. So I think that you look at everything, and you also have to look at what happens when you bring the second unit in.”
And so: Thibodeau rolled with the same starting five Friday … and got an up-close-and-personal look at more of the same.
The Pacers raced out to a 19-9 start in 6 1/2 minutes against a Knicks team looking a step slow physically and tactically. And when Thibodeau went to his second unit — which is to say, Robinson and McBride, the two dudes off the bench who actually play — New York promptly ripped off a 10-0 run.
An offensive rebound and tip-in by Robinson gave the Knicks a lead heading into the second quarter. They extended it in mix-and-match minutes featuring the double-big lineup of Robinson and Towns, who scored 12 points in the first 5:14 of the second to help New York open a seven-point lead.
Mitchell Robinson with the block, and Karl-Anthony Towns scores the 3-pointer off the offensive rebound. pic.twitter.com/5B9Z8Excrx
As is their wont, though, the Pacers walked them down, playing through All-Star forward Pascal Siakam, who repeatedly roasted whichever Knicks defender he drew en route to 23 first-half points to allow Indiana to stay connected, going into halftime down just three at 52-49.
It’s worth noting that, after that rough game-opening 19-9 stretch, Thibodeau didn’t go back to his full starting five for the rest of the first half — a span that saw New York outscore Indiana 43-30. The Knicks came out of halftime with that same unit, though … and allowed a 15-7 run that put Indiana on top, prompting a Thibodeau timeout just over five minutes into the third quarter.
Thibodeau did not make any substitutions coming out of that timeout, though, sticking with his full starting five until sending Robinson in for Towns at the 4:18 mark, with New York trailing by three. The Knicks would regain the lead a couple of minutes later and go into the fourth tied, thanks to a beautiful up-and-under on Andrew Nembhard by Brunson, who once again looked extremely comfortable scoring in isolation on any defender Indiana threw at him:
Jalen Brunson with the beautiful up-and-under on Andrew Nembhard, at the end of the 3rd quarter (with a replay) pic.twitter.com/A9X6pGmoPs
With both teams scoring efficiently through the first three quarters — 81 points on 67 possessions for the Knicks, good for a 120.9 offensive rating; 81 on 68 possessions for the Pacers, a 119.1 clip — it seemed the fourth quarter would come down to which team could generate enough stops. The Pacers quickly made a compelling argument the Knicks couldn’t — at least, not with Towns and Robinson on the floor together.
Indiana opened the fourth repeatedly looking to hunt Towns, running pick-and-rolls at him to get him moving his feet and see if he could remain locked into his coverage. It proved fruitful: an open pull-up jumper for T.J. McConnell when Towns gave him too much room in drop coverage; an open dunk for Myles Turner after Towns had leapt up to trap McConnell and then sort of floated in space, leaving Robinson to make the unenviable choice between staying home and giving up a wide-open Siakam 3 or covering the arc to concede the paint.
When Towns shifted over to Siakam, Indiana went at Robinson, running an empty-corner McConnell-Turner side pick-and-roll to once again force Robinson to make a decision in space. He jumped out at McConnell, who just dropped the ball off to Turner for a midrange bank shot, with Towns not rotating over quickly enough to get a hand up on the contest.
They poked at the bigs’ help-side defense again a couple of possessions later: first with Turner setting an off-ball screen for Ben Sheppard to allow the reserve Pacers wing to pop free for another open triple ahead of a late Towns contest, and then with Sheppard making a well-timed cut to draw the attention of both Robinson and Cameron Payne, leaving Siakam — again — wide open for a catch-and-shoot 3 to cap a 13-4 run that put Indiana back in control of the game.
After that, Thibodeau subbed out Towns. He sat on the bench, watching Robinson man the middle with Brunson, Anunoby, Bridges and McBride … and he stayed on the pine for the next 6 1/2 minutes.
Asked in the locker room if it was tough to lose a game after spending most of the fourth quarter on the sideline, Towns paused before saying, “It’s tough to lose anyway. So, just got to regroup and get ready for the next one.”
“We got in a hole, and then the group that was in there gave us a chance, so we [were] just riding them,” Thibodeau said. “Just searching for a way to win.”
They nearly found it. Brunson and Bridges combined for 18 points in the final nine minutes, including five points in 34 seconds by Brunson to get New York back within three, followed by an assist to a cutting Hart to cut the deficit to one — a possession that netted points, but saw precious seconds tick off the clock.
“I was looking for a 3,” Brunson said. “But I just saw him wide open, and with enough time to play the ‘trap, steal, foul’ game.”
The Knicks did foul Aaron Nesmith on the ensuing inbounds, sending the Game 1 hero to the line for two clutch free throws. He drilled both, leaving New York down by three with 14.7 seconds remaining and one timeout. Thibodeau elected not to take it, preferring to give Brunson the chance to attack in the open court rather than advancing the ball into the frontcourt but allowing Indiana to load up on the inbounds to prevent him from ever getting it. An edge-of-the-logo prayer went unanswered, the final buzzer sounded, and the Knicks found themselves exactly where they didn’t want to be: in the same place Cleveland was last round, heading to Indiana down 2-0, a predicament in which the team with the two-game lead has historically won the series 92% of the time.
Teams in NBA history to come back from down 0-2 in Conference Finals after losing first 2 games at home:
“Don’t worry about that — I told you about the word ‘history,’” Towns said. “I’m not here to repeat it. We’re here to make it. If I’ve learned anything, especially last year [with the Timberwolves, during their series against the Nuggets], as quick as you win two games is as quick as you can lose two games.”
The run of play won’t just turn on its own, though; the Knicks will have to make it. Not getting down big early would be an awfully nice start — provided they can find the answer to why they keep doing that.
“I’m not sure, man,” Bridges said. “I don’t know if we’re just … I think it’s maybe a defensive thing? I gotta see. Sometimes, you’re just so — you’re in it, you know, you gotta go back and watch the game. But I don’t know, man. I think you just gotta talk to each other off the jump, be physical off the jump. I think maybe we’re just playing a little too soft in the beginning of halves. Yeah, I’m not sure.”
Thibodeau, for his part, was more focused on how the Knicks ended the game than how they started it.
“It comes down to a couple of things,” he said. “Going into the fourth quarter, it’s a tie ballgame, and we just got make better plays. More winning plays. … We had a chance to tie the ballgame. It’s a hard-fought game. Both games came down to the last play.”
That’s not always the lens he sees it through, though. Asked before the game about the importance of getting some production out of backup point guard Payne, Thibodeau took a broader view.
“Well, you need production from everybody,” he said. “It’s not an individual thing. It’s a group thing. How does the group function together?”
At this point, one thing is abundantly clear: The group that Thibodeau trusts most is not functioning together effectively enough to give the Knicks the edge they need in a hyper competitive series against an excellent opponent that has already taken two games on New York’s home court. Thibodeau insists he looks at everything. Before Game 3 in Indiana on Sunday, he might need to look a little harder — including, perhaps, at why he’s not seeing what’s in front of his face.
NEW YORK — If you find yourself in a hole, you should probably stop digging.
The New York Knicks are in the Eastern Conference finals for the first time since 2000. They won 51 games this season — the most any Knicks team has won since 2011-12. They’ve won 50-plus in consecutive seasons for the first time since the 1993-94 and 1994-95 campaigns. On Friday, point guard Jalen Brunson and center Karl-Anthony Towns were both named to the All-NBA team — just the fifth time in franchise history two Knicks earned selections in the same year.
This has been, by virtually any measuring stick, the franchise’s best season in a quarter-century. The Knicks have gotten this far. Might as well stick with what got you here, right?
“We’re just putting ourselves in a deficit, and I told you how we can’t keep doing that,” Towns said Friday. “It’s not every time we’re gonna be able to fight back and find ourselves with a win, so, you know, just gotta execute and be more disciplined.”
The Pacers made life tough for Karl-Anthony Towns in Game 2 of the Eastern Conference finals on Friday night. (Photo by Elsa/Getty Images)
Elsa via Getty Images
And after Friday’s 114-109 loss to Indiana — a defeat that earned the visiting Pacers a road sweep at Madison Square Garden, and with it, total control of the best-of-seven series — the first five has been outscored by 29 points in just 43 minutes against Rick Carlisle’s club.
“Yeah, we just gotta keep looking at it,” Thibodeau said after the loss. “Gotta do better.”
Asked a follow-up question about whether, down 2-0, the time had come to more strongly consider a change, Thibodeau brusquely replied, “We always look at everything.”
Thibodeau has fielded plenty of questions about the struggles of the starting lineup — about the inability to find consistent answers when teams cross-match their centers onto Hart and wings onto Towns, about whether swapping either more shooting (in the form of guard Miles McBride) or more size and paint protection (in the form of center Mitchell Robinson) in for Hart might better balance the group, about whether the current structure best maximizes the offensive production of Bridges and Anunoby, etc. He’s stayed the course, though, insisting before Game 2 that no matter how grim the plus-minus numbers seemed, he didn’t view them through that simple of a lens.
“It’s hard to just look at it that way,” he said. “There’s a lot of mixing and matching. Sometimes they’re with the second unit, as well. So I think that you look at everything, and you also have to look at what happens when you bring the second unit in.”
And so: Thibodeau rolled with the same starting five Friday … and got an up-close-and-personal look at more of the same.
The Pacers raced out to a 19-9 start in 6 1/2 minutes against a Knicks team looking a step slow physically and tactically. And when Thibodeau went to his second unit — which is to say, Robinson and McBride, the two dudes off the bench who actually play — New York promptly ripped off a 10-0 run.
An offensive rebound and tip-in by Robinson gave the Knicks a lead heading into the second quarter. They extended it in mix-and-match minutes featuring the double-big lineup of Robinson and Towns, who scored 12 points in the first 5:14 of the second to help New York open a seven-point lead.
Mitchell Robinson with the block, and Karl-Anthony Towns scores the 3-pointer off the offensive rebound. pic.twitter.com/5B9Z8Excrx
As is their wont, though, the Pacers walked them down, playing through All-Star forward Pascal Siakam, who repeatedly roasted whichever Knicks defender he drew en route to 23 first-half points to allow Indiana to stay connected, going into halftime down just three at 52-49.
It’s worth noting that, after that rough game-opening 19-9 stretch, Thibodeau didn’t go back to his full starting five for the rest of the first half — a span that saw New York outscore Indiana 43-30. The Knicks came out of halftime with that same unit, though … and allowed a 15-7 run that put Indiana on top, prompting a Thibodeau timeout just over five minutes into the third quarter.
Thibodeau did not make any substitutions coming out of that timeout, though, sticking with his full starting five until sending Robinson in for Towns at the 4:18 mark, with New York trailing by three. The Knicks would regain the lead a couple of minutes later and go into the fourth tied, thanks to a beautiful up-and-under on Andrew Nembhard by Brunson, who once again looked extremely comfortable scoring in isolation on any defender Indiana threw at him:
Jalen Brunson with the beautiful up-and-under on Andrew Nembhard, at the end of the 3rd quarter (with a replay) pic.twitter.com/A9X6pGmoPs
With both teams scoring efficiently through the first three quarters — 81 points on 67 possessions for the Knicks, good for a 120.9 offensive rating; 81 on 68 possessions for the Pacers, a 119.1 clip — it seemed the fourth quarter would come down to which team could generate enough stops. The Pacers quickly made a compelling argument the Knicks couldn’t — at least, not with Towns and Robinson on the floor together.
Indiana opened the fourth repeatedly looking to hunt Towns, running pick-and-rolls at him to get him moving his feet and see if he could remain locked into his coverage. It proved fruitful: an open pull-up jumper for T.J. McConnell when Towns gave him too much room in drop coverage; an open dunk for Myles Turner after Towns had leapt up to trap McConnell and then sort of floated in space, leaving Robinson to make the unenviable choice between staying home and giving up a wide-open Siakam 3 or covering the arc to concede the paint.
When Towns shifted over to Siakam, Indiana went at Robinson, running an empty-corner McConnell-Turner side pick-and-roll to once again force Robinson to make a decision in space. He jumped out at McConnell, who just dropped the ball off to Turner for a midrange bank shot, with Towns not rotating over quickly enough to get a hand up on the contest.
They poked at the bigs’ help-side defense again a couple of possessions later: first with Turner setting an off-ball screen for Ben Sheppard to allow the reserve Pacers wing to pop free for another open triple ahead of a late Towns contest, and then with Sheppard making a well-timed cut to draw the attention of both Robinson and Cameron Payne, leaving Siakam — again — wide open for a catch-and-shoot 3 to cap a 13-4 run that put Indiana back in control of the game.
After that, Thibodeau subbed out Towns. He sat on the bench, watching Robinson man the middle with Brunson, Anunoby, Bridges and McBride … and he stayed on the pine for the next 6 1/2 minutes.
Asked in the locker room if it was tough to lose a game after spending most of the fourth quarter on the sideline, Towns paused before saying, “It’s tough to lose anyway. So, just got to regroup and get ready for the next one.”
“We got in a hole, and then the group that was in there gave us a chance, so we [were] just riding them,” Thibodeau said. “Just searching for a way to win.”
They nearly found it. Brunson and Bridges combined for 18 points in the final nine minutes, including five points in 34 seconds by Brunson to get New York back within three, followed by an assist to a cutting Hart to cut the deficit to one — a possession that netted points, but saw precious seconds tick off the clock.
“I was looking for a 3,” Brunson said. “But I just saw him wide open, and with enough time to play the ‘trap, steal, foul’ game.”
The Knicks did foul Aaron Nesmith on the ensuing inbounds, sending the Game 1 hero to the line for two clutch free throws. He drilled both, leaving New York down by three with 14.7 seconds remaining and one timeout. Thibodeau elected not to take it, preferring to give Brunson the chance to attack in the open court rather than advancing the ball into the frontcourt but allowing Indiana to load up on the inbounds to prevent him from ever getting it. An edge-of-the-logo prayer went unanswered, the final buzzer sounded, and the Knicks found themselves exactly where they didn’t want to be: in the same place Cleveland was last round, heading to Indiana down 2-0, a predicament in which the team with the two-game lead has historically won the series 92% of the time.
Teams in NBA history to come back from down 0-2 in Conference Finals after losing first 2 games at home:
“Don’t worry about that — I told you about the word ‘history,’” Towns said. “I’m not here to repeat it. We’re here to make it. If I’ve learned anything, especially last year [with the Timberwolves, during their series against the Nuggets], as quick as you win two games is as quick as you can lose two games.”
The run of play won’t just turn on its own, though; the Knicks will have to make it. Not getting down big early would be an awfully nice start — provided they can find the answer to why they keep doing that.
“I’m not sure, man,” Bridges said. “I don’t know if we’re just … I think it’s maybe a defensive thing? I gotta see. Sometimes, you’re just so — you’re in it, you know, you gotta go back and watch the game. But I don’t know, man. I think you just gotta talk to each other off the jump, be physical off the jump. I think maybe we’re just playing a little too soft in the beginning of halves. Yeah, I’m not sure.”
Thibodeau, for his part, was more focused on how the Knicks ended the game than how they started it.
“It comes down to a couple of things,” he said. “Going into the fourth quarter, it’s a tie ballgame, and we just got make better plays. More winning plays. … We had a chance to tie the ballgame. It’s a hard-fought game. Both games came down to the last play.”
That’s not always the lens he sees it through, though. Asked before the game about the importance of getting some production out of backup point guard Payne, Thibodeau took a broader view.
“Well, you need production from everybody,” he said. “It’s not an individual thing. It’s a group thing. How does the group function together?”
At this point, one thing is abundantly clear: The group that Thibodeau trusts most is not functioning together effectively enough to give the Knicks the edge they need in a hyper competitive series against an excellent opponent that has already taken two games on New York’s home court. Thibodeau insists he looks at everything. Before Game 3 in Indiana on Sunday, he might need to look a little harder — including, perhaps, at why he’s not seeing what’s in front of his face.
NEW YORK — On Friday night, the Dodgers emerged victorious, technically speaking. The defending champions outlasted the Mets 7-5 in an ugly, delirious, rain-soaked, 13-inning slopfest. The game started at 7:10 p.m. ET. It ended just before 1 a.m.
There will be bleary-eyed ballplayers on Saturday.
Even though L.A. won the battle, the night that would not end has created something of a conundrum. Ahead of the Dodgers: a grueling month-long stretch, 26 consecutive games against teams with winning records. To commence that imposing slice of the schedule, this club would have loved a simple, painless opening act. One that might have allowed its overtaxed pitching staff a breather.
That’s not what happened.
Instead, a combo of rain and extra innings forced Dodgers skipper Dave Roberts to use nearly every arm in his already exhausted bullpen. It was a pyrrhic victory of epic proportions.
When Luis García, the eighth pitcher of the night, recorded the final out of the game on a lineout in the bottom of the 13th, the Dodgers poured out onto the Citi Field dirt for a high-five line.
But it’s hard to describe the night as a “win.”
“It’s a tough way to start the road trip, just like depleting the bullpen like that, obviously,” Dodgers starter Clayton Kershaw said postgame. “But the Mets had to do the same thing, and they lost.”
It was a long Friday night for the Mets’ Francisco Alvarez and the visiting Dodgers. (Photo by Mike Stobe/Getty Images)
Mike Stobe via Getty Images
Kershaw lasted just two frames, not because the Mets bludgeoned him into an early exit, but because the heavens opened up. A torrential downpour in the top of the third inning paused the proceedings for over an hour, forcing Kershaw and opposing starter Griffin Canning from the contest.
Eventually, the rain stopped, the game resumed and, of course, the Dodgers leapt out to a 5-2 lead. That’s what this team does; use a high-powered lineup to overcome its rotation shortcomings.
Except, this time, things went sideways. Its over-taxed bullpen faltered. Its best reliever coughed up three runs in the ninth. Its offense sputtered into neutral, failing to score across the first three extra innings. The end — a Teoscar Hernández RBI double in the top of the 13th — barely justified the means.
Before the game, Dodgers manager Dave Roberts was adamant about needing more length from his starting pitchers. No team in baseball has gotten less length from its rotation. That has left Los Angeles’ bullpen often overworked and undermanned.
No team in MLB has received fewer innings from its rotation this season. In fact, the Dodgers are the only team in baseball whose starters have averaged fewer than 14 outs recorded per start. Despite a sensational first two months from Cy Young frontrunner Yoshinobu Yamamoto (1.86 ERA in 10 starts), Los Angeles’ 4.26 rotation ERA currently ranks 22nd in baseball.
“We’ve been working behind hitters way too often,” Roberts opined before Friday’s game, “Not being efficient with our pitches, giving up a lot more slug than we’re used to.”
That underperformance has a lot to do with the injury bug. Los Angeles has been decimated by it, forcing the Dodgers to dig deep down the depth chart for replacements. The Dodgers weathered a similar dynamic late in the regular season last year and into their October title run. But this ailment avalanche has appeared at a particularly inopportune time for the defending champs.
That’s because these Dodgers are now one night into a gauntlet, one that may come to define their season. Awaiting them at Citi Field on Friday: 26 games in 28 days, all against teams with winning records. They began the stretch with a win, but it won’t get easier from here.
Rough stretch includes Guardians, Yankees, more Mets and Padres
After completing this series in Queens, the Dodgers will head to Cleveland for three against the 28-22 Cleveland Guardians, a team that was three wins away from the Fall Classic a season ago. Next, L.A. returns home for a World Series rematch against the AL East-leading New York Yankees. After that highly charged showdown, the Mets come to town for a four-game set.
Then, without an off-day mixed in, L.A. heads to St. Louis for three against a surprising Cardinals club and then to San Diego for a set against a division rival. To finish the gauntlet, four at home against the second-place San Francisco Giants and three more with the Padres.
Asked if the upcoming schedule carries any additional heft, Roberts didn’t mince words.
“It does. It does,” the two-time World Series winning skipper said. “Obviously playing teams that are talented, that are playing well, we’re going to be forced to play really good baseball consistently. But this is going to be a good test for us, and we can’t run away from the fact that we’re playing some good teams.”
It’s an imposing stretch. Nobody in baseball will play even the smallest violin for the Dodgers and their impending tribulations. Every team in MLB faces a tough scheduling patch at some point during the 162-game marathon. That’s a fact of life.
“I think that obviously, this stretch, you know, could be defining,” Roberts said. “But I do think that with all that said, you’ve got to focus on each day at hand. That’s what we’ve been very good at doing, and we have to continue to do [it]. So I’m not going to worry too much more after this conversation about the 26 games.”
The Dodgers are reliant on Shohei Ohtani’s MVP bat. They might be desperate for his arm to get back into shape on the mound this season. (Photo by Daniel Shirey/MLB Photos via Getty Images)
Daniel Shirey via Getty Images
There are, at present, 14 pitchers on Los Angeles’ injured list, seven of which are starters. Notably, that includes Blake Snell, Tyler Glasnow and Roki Sasaki, all of whom were in the club’s Opening Day rotation. Four high-leverage relief arms — Evan Phillips, Michael Kopech, Blake Treinen and Kirby Yates — are also on the shelf.
This reality has pushed multiple hurlers into positions and situations that would have seemed inconceivable back in spring training. Matt Sauer, who had a 7.71 ERA for the Kansas City Royals last season, hurled three solid innings in relief against the Mets. He is currently 11th on the team in innings. Jack Dreyer, a 26-year-old rookie who ranked 18th on FanGraphs Dodgers prospect list, is fifth. García, a 38-year-old journeyman, is tied for second on the team in appearances.
“We have to have confidence in those guys.” Roberts said pregame on Friday. “There’s some guys that I certainly didn’t expect on our roster right now pitching, but I’m throwing them out there and leverage and giving them an opportunity.”
There aren’t any obvious reinforcements coming any time soon. Glasnow threw a bullpen in Los Angeles on Saturday, but there still isn’t a timetable on his return. For Snell and Sasaki, things are even cloudier. And then of course, there’s Shohei Ohtani.
Saturday was supposed to be a big day for the reigning NL MVP. He was set to face live hitters for the first time since his September 2023 Tommy John surgery. But the never-ending contest Friday night pushed Ohtani to move his simulated game to Sunday. The session will be fascinating, though how it goes likely won’t move the needle on his return date. The overwhelming expectation is that the two-way dynamo won’t be back on a big league mound before the All-Star break. The rationale: L.A. could use his arm, but they absolutely cannot afford to lose his bat.
And so, this rickety golden colossus will trudge forward with what it has. So far, that’s been enough. But considering what’s ahead of the Dodgers, we’ll know a lot more about them in a month’s time.
NEW YORK (AP) — The Indiana Pacers are headed home, halfway to a chance to play for an elusive NBA title.
They might prefer to stay right where they are.
Pascal Siakam scored a playoff career-high 39 points, and the Pacers beat the New York Knicks 114-109 on Friday night for a 2-0 lead in the Eastern Conference finals.
Game 3 is Sunday night in Indiana, which will be rocking all day long with the Indianapolis 500 being run that afternoon. The Pacers can only hope to be as good there as they’ve been on the road, where they have won six straight games since falling at Milwaukee in Game 3 of the first round.
“We have a long way to go and it’s only going to get tougher for us,” Siakam said.
Myles Turner added 16 points and Tyrese Haliburton had 14 points, 11 assists and eight rebounds for the Pacers, who lost to the Lakers in 2000 in their only NBA Finals appearance.
Siakam finished 15 for 23 from the field on a night nobody else on the high-scoring Pacers had more than five baskets.
“Special game,” Pacers coach Rick Carlisle said. “In the first half he was the guy that got us going and got us through some difficult stretches.”
Jalen Brunson had 36 points and 11 assists for the Knicks, who need a quick turnaround or their first appearance in the conference finals in 25 years will be a brief one. They defended much better after their crushing collapse in a 138-135 overtime loss in Game 1, but couldn’t find enough scoring to come back after a bad start to the fourth quarter.
Mikal Bridges and Karl-Anthony Towns each had 20 points and seven rebounds for the Knicks, but Towns played just 28 minutes as coach Tom Thibodeau went longer with backup Mitchell Robinson, a much better defender who grabbed nine rebounds.
No team has lost the first two games at home and come back to win a series in the conference finals.
“Going into the fourth quarter it’s a tie ballgame. We’ve just got to make better plays, more winning plays,” Thibodeau said.
It was tied at 81 after three, before the Pacers opened the fourth with a 13-4 run to move ahead 94-85 on Siakam’s 3-pointer with 9:17 remaining. They would quickly push the margin back to around there every time the Knicks got any momentum, and it was 110-100 after another basket by Siakam with 2:45 to play.
The Knicks scored nine straight to make it 110-109 on Josh Hart’s basket with 14 seconds to go. Aaron Nesmith made two free throws for the Pacers, Brunson was well off on a 3-point attempt and Turner finished it out with two free throws.
The 50th playoff meeting between the rivals – the Pacers lead 28-22, all since 1993 – more closely resembled their defensive battles of the 1990s than the shootout of two nights earlier.
Indiana raced to a 19-9 lead, but the Knicks quickly caught them when Robinson and Deuce McBride entered and the game remained within a single-digit margin nearly the entire rest of the night.
Pete Crow-Armstrong‘s grand slam in the eighth inning lifted the Chicago Cubs to an 8-6 lead and an eventual 13-6 win over the Cincinnati Reds on Friday night. Armstrong hit two home runs with six RBI, putting him among the league leaders in both categories in what’s been an impressive start to his 2025 season.
Crow-Armstrong’s first homer was a two-run shot in the fourth that put the Cubs on the board after falling behind 4-0. Reds pitcher Hunter Greene threw a 100-mph fastball on the outside edge of the strike zone, yet Crow-Armstrong still pulled it into the right field seats.
The grand slam came with a bit more suspense to it. Crow-Armstrong yanked a hanging Tony Santillan slider down the right field line and seemingly willed the fly ball to go fair. The play was reviewed but the home run was upheld, giving Chicago its first lead of the game after falling behind by four runs twice to that point.
With 14 home runs, Crow-Armstrong is tied for third in MLB behind four players with 17 and another two who have 15. And his 45 RBI are also tied for third, just behind teammate Seiya Suzuki‘s 46. Suzuki had had three RBI of his own in Friday’s win.
Just don’t ask Crow-Armstrong how he’s doing it. Asked what goes through his mind when he thinks about leading MLB in home runs since April 13, he replied, “Nothing.”
Suzuki and Crow-Armstrong both trail Boston Red Sox slugger Rafael Devers, who has 47 RBI after driving in eight runs in a 19-8 defeat of the Baltimore Orioles earlier in the day.
Devers also blasted two home runs, the first of them a three-run shot in the sixth off Orioles reliever Gregory Soto. Soto’s slider caught enough of the inside part of the plate for Devers to crush to right-center field for a 6-2 Boston lead.
In the eighth, the Red Sox’s designated hitter drove in another five runs in two separate at-bats. He began with an RBI single that drove in Jarren Duran. Devers then returned to the plate with Boston leading 11-3, and Baltimore decided to use third baseman Emmanuel Rivera as a pitcher to give the bullpen a break.
Rivera tried to get by with arching eephus pitches but Devers timed the fourth one, which hung in the middle of the strike zone and was launched into the right field bullpen.
Devers’ big day came after Red Sox third baseman Alex Bregman left the game after pulling his right quad muscle while rounding first base in the fifth inning. That immediately prompted questions as to whether or not Devers might return to his former position at third base if Bregman is sidelined for a while.
Yet Devers’ performance probably answered that by demonstrating emphatically how comfortable he is at DH right now. With 12 home runs, he currently ranks fifth in MLB to go with his league-leading RBI total.
In May, Devers is batting .419/.517/.757 with seven homers and 28 RBI. That 0-for-19 start with 15 strikeouts is long gone. And presumably, Red Sox manager Alex Cora is not going to mess with that.
Pascal Siakam scored 39 points, a career playoff high, leading the Indiana Pacers to a 114-109 win over the New York Knicks in Game 2 of the Eastern Conference finals on Friday night at Madison Square Garden.
It is the first time in franchise history the Knicks have lost the first two games of a playoff series at home.
The Pacers broke an 83-83 tie early in the fourth quarter with an 11-2 run, capped by a 3-pointer from Siakam. New York cut the deficit to three points at three different times, but Indiana answered each challenge, notably on 3s by Turner and Haliburton, who finally hit big shots late after being quiet through most of the game.
The Knicks cut Indiana’s lead to 110-109 with 14.1 seconds remaining in regulation on a layup by Josh Hart, but Jalen Brunson fouled Nesmith on the ensuing inbounds, and the 91.3% free-thow shooter converted both attempts. Brunson then missed a long 3-point try, and Turner hit two more free throws after being fouled.
“We don’t care about who scores, we just wanna win the game,” Siakam told TNT after the game.
Brunson scored 36 points with 11 assists for New York, but missed his final two 3-pointers. Karl-Anthony Towns and Mikal Bridges each added 20 points, but Towns, who finished a game-high minus-20, sat for most of the fourth quarter.
“We got in a hole, and the group that was in there gave us a chance,” Knicks head coach Tom Thibodeau told reporters after the game about Towns’ benching.
Pascal Siakam started his barrage early
The Pacers demonstrated the depth of their lineup early on with Siakam scoring their first 11 points. Nesmith and Nembhard scored Indiana’s next eight, pushing the Pacers to a 19-9 lead midway through the first quarter.
However, New York then went on a 10-0 run to tie the game, fueled by 3-pointers from Miles McBride and Brunson. At that point, perhaps Indiana needed a basket from Haliburton to get steady, but instead Siakam added another five points. The Knicks ended the quarter with a 26-24 lead on a dunk by OG Anunoby and a tip-in from Mitchell Robinson.
Indiana trailed 52-49 at halftime with Haliburton scoring only two points on 1-of-7 shooting with five assists. Brunson provided his expected production with 17 points, and Siakam had 23 points in the opening 24 minutes against a bigger lineup with Towns and Robinson. However, going bigger gave the Knicks a 21-14 rebounding edge, preventing Indiana from running and playing at a faster pace.
“When you play such a terrible half like that and you’re only down 3, I think that gives you a lot of confidence,” Haliburton told TNT after the game.
The Knicks’ momentum didn’t hold in the second half as the Pacers picked up the tempo and posted their two highest-scoring quarters of the game. The Pacers now return to the comfort of their home crowd at Gainbridge Fieldhouse.
“You cannot assume going home is gonna be easier,” Pacers head coach Rick Carlisle told reporters after the game.
Game 3 of the Eastern Conference Finals is scheduled for Sunday at 8 p.m. ET.
The New York Knicks blew a 14-point lead in the fourth quarter of Game 1 against the Indiana Pacers on Wednesday in the NBA’s Eastern Conference finals, that game resulted in a 138-135 come-from-behind win for the Pacers at Madison Square Garden. The two teams will return to MSG on Friday night for Game 2 where the Knicks (and their many celebrity fans) will seek redemption as they try to even up the series.
You can catch this game – and every other game of the Eastern Conference finals – on TNT and Max. Here’s everything you need to know about how to watch the Knicks vs. Pacers series.
How to watch the Indiana Pacers vs. New York Knicks:
Dates: May 23, 2025
Time: 8 p.m. ET (Game 2)
TV channel: TNT, TruTV
Streaming: Max, Sling, DirecTV and more
Where to watch the Knicks vs. Pacers Eastern Conference Finals:
You can tune in to every game of the New York Knicks vs. Indiana Pacers series on TNT and truTV. These channels are available on platforms like DirecTV, Sling and Fubo. The game will also be streaming on Max.
NBA Eastern Conference Finals channel:
All games in the NBA Eastern Conference finals series between the Pacers and Knicks will air on TNT and truTV.
How to watch the NBA Eastern Conference Finals without cable:
Who is playing in the NBA Eastern Conference Finals?
This year, the New York Knicks will face the Indiana Pacers in the Eastern Conference finals.
Two years ago, as Jalen Brunson emerged as an All-Star point guard for the NBA’s New York Knicks, the head coach of the WNBA’s Las Vegas Aces, Becky Hammon, declared on an ESPN panel, “If your best player is small, you’re not winning. John Stockton, Allen Iverson, Steve Nash. You could go down the list.”
“Steph Curry is the only one,” she said, and she was mostly right, excepting Isiah Thomas, among others.
Guards, especially small ones, have rarely led their teams to championships in the NBA.
“And I love Jalen Brunson,” added Hammon, “but you’re gonna put him on the level of a 1A?”
That was then. This is now, when the Knicks, led by Brunson, are in the Eastern Conference finals. They lost Game 1 in heartbreaking fashion to an Indiana Pacers team led by another point guard, Tyrese Haliburton, who, akin to Brunson, has recently been derided as “the league’s most overrated player.”
Whichever team wins the title this season will be led by a guard. Out West, the Oklahoma City Thunder, as betting favorites, according to BetMGM, are captained by Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, the NBA’s MVP. And the Minnesota Timberwolves are led by Anthony Edwards, a smooth and skilled 23-year-old dynamo.
(Joseph Raines/Yahoo Sports Illustration)
Only one other time has each of the four conference finalists featured a guard as its best player — 1991, as Michael Jordan’s Chicago Bulls, Isiah Thomas’ Detroit Pistons, Magic Johnson’s Los Angeles Lakers and Clyde Drexler’s Portland Trail Blazers filled the field. Think about them for a moment: MJ, Isiah, Magic and Clyde, four of the 18 guards on the NBA’s 50th anniversary team. Think of this year’s class in that light.
The NBA was dominated by big men through the 1960s and for most of the 1970s — until the arrival of Magic Johnson, and even he was 6-foot-9. The league has been run in more recent decades by similarly big and ball-dominant forwards, from Larry Bird and Julius Erving to LeBron James and Kevin Durant.
By our count, only 22 of the NBA’s 77 championship teams have been led by guards, and 18 of those titles have been won by six of the all-timers at the guard positions: Stephen Curry, Isiah Thomas and Magic Johnson; Dwyane Wade, Kobe Bryant, and Michael Jordan. You could make a case that this list covers the three greatest players in league history at both the point and shooting guard positions. Which means, if you are not among the very best guards ever, it is awfully difficult to lead your team to a championship.
The other guards who led their teams to titles are also Hall of Famers: Chauncey Billups (2004), Dennis Johnson (1979) and Walt Frazier (1970, 1973). They won with ensemble supporting casts, if they were not part of the ensemble themselves. You can make a case that none of them were their teams’ best player.
Ben Wallace, a Hall of Famer, was the only All-NBA member of the 2004 Detroit Pistons. Jack Sikma, a Hall of Famer, finished seventh in MVP voting on the 1979 Seattle SuperSonics. And Willis Reed, a Hall of Famer, was the league’s MVP in 1970 and New York’s Finals MVP for both championships (though Frazier deserved at least one of them when Reed was injured in 1970, as he posted a 36-7-19 in a Game 7 win).
As good as Jalen Williams, Julius Randle, Karl-Anthony Towns and Pascal Siakam are for the Thunder, Wolves, Knicks and Pacers, respectively, there is no mistaking who the best player is on each of those franchises. The question, then: To which group do this year’s guards belong, all-timers or anomalies?
Here is how the four star guards stack up against the others who led their teams to titles. They are sorted by playoff Player Efficiency Rating. (Production and efficiency numbers are also playoff statistics.)
Gilgeous-Alexander is, believe it or not, on a similar trajectory to the greatest guards ever. The 26-year-old is this season’s MVP, and if he wins Finals MVP en route to a ring, his will absolutely belong among the greatest guard seasons ever. Curry, Jordan and Magic are the only guards to win both awards in the same year. Think about it for a second. Curry, Jordan and Magic, arguably the three best guards ever. And SGA.
Haliburton, 25, and Edwards, 23, are so young that it is hard to wrap our heads around what a title would mean for either of them. No guards but Wade and Magic have led a team to a championship at so young an age. Either Haliburton, Edwards or both may be on meteoric trajectories toward the pantheon, even if we have not yet fully considered that possibility. Most of their damage could be done in years to come.
Brunson’s case may be the most interesting one. He is a 28-year-old former second-round pick who will make his second All-NBA team in as many seasons. Nobody will call him the best player in the league if New York wins the championship. (Nor will we say that about Haliburton, by the way. We might consider the possibility that Edwards could be the NBA’s best player at some point very soon if he should win.)
Still, Brunson has received MVP votes in each of the past three seasons. He finished 10th this season and fifth last season. He has been somewhere among the 10 best players in the NBA for two years running, and he stands 6-foot-2. A 6-4 Dennis Johnson was top-10 twice in a watered-down NBA. A 6-3 Billups was a top-10 player for a season. Brunson can be like them, at once a Hall of Famer and a historical anomaly.
But Frazier was, for six years straight, either first- or second-team All-NBA. He is a two-time champion, a Hall of Famer, a New York legend to this day as the team’s color commentator. He is the embodiment of those ’70s Knicks. That he is the ceiling for Brunson is as fitting as it gets. Get Brunson a statement suit.
This is what these playoffs have given us, memories refreshed, reminding us of all-time greats. Make no mistake: These guards — Gilgeous-Alexander, Edwards, Brunson and Haliburton — belong among them.
