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When the Knicks hired Mike Brown as head coach this offseason, it was in part to address specific failings from previous seasons. Two in particular were the underutilization of the bench and the lack of experimentation during the regular season.
If you wanted to grade Brown on the job he’s doing, the only metric that will satisfy Knicks fans is whether he wins a championship or not. In the meantime, he’s managed to help secure the city an NBA Cup title, relying on the very things the Knicks had been ignoring before he took over.
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Taking on Victor Wembanyama and the San Antonio Spurs coming off a victory over the streaking Oklahoma City Thunder would be no easy task. The Knicks found themselves trailing for most of the first three quarters, until Tyler Kolek and Jordan Clarkson turned things around.
The two bench guards closed the third quarter strong, and Brown rode them through the final period, even playing them alongside Jalen Brunson. New York would win the fourth quarter 35-19 to take home the Cup, as Clarkson finished with 15 points while Kolek chipped in 14 points, five rebounds and five assists.
Brown made a clever in-game adjustment, but Tom Thibodeau had made many of those, so what’s the big deal? It’s that these looks weren’t thrown out there with no prior experience as a desperate last measure, rather they had a foundation of being tried and developed during the season.
Going to the three-guard lineup of Brunson-Kolek-Clarkson was something Brown could do after playing that group together in three games prior and seeing Miles McBride-Kolek-Clarkson over nearly 10 games. For comparison, Thibodeau made a similar adjustment in last year’s playoffs, with a McBride-Landry Shamet–Delon Wright bench unit winning key minutes in the Conference Finals, yet only appeared for 10 minutes in the regular season.
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This was just the primary example. Brown threw out multiple defensive schemes and lineup combinations to keep the Spurs on their toes, backed by trying them out in previous games.
Not only did Brown have his team ready to play in unique circumstances, but he had end-of-bench…
Source link : https://sports.yahoo.com/articles/mike-browns-trust-knicks-bench-190023138.html
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Publish date : 2025-12-18 19:00:00
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