NEW YORK — Just last month, two games against the Philadelphia 76ers scrambled Josh Hart’s brain.
Hart had drained multiple 3-pointers in seven of his previous eight games, but a couple of consecutive meetings with the Sixers ruined the heater — and not because they took him out of his comfort zone. Instead, they urged him to get as cozy as he could.
The 76ers sagged off Hart, daring him to shoot 3s. The strategy worked. Even as Philly defenders watched from afar, Hart missed jumper after jumper.
“Sometimes I would rather a guy be flying at me because then it’s just instinct, just motion,” Hart said. “Sometimes when I have the space, then I’m overly thinking. I’m like, ‘All right, where’s my hand placement? Where’s my elbow?’ Those kinds of things. So that’s always something I’ve kind of always struggled with a little bit.”
Saturday, when the New York Knicks faced the 76ers for the first time since that mid-March series, Hart experienced the same approach. Philadelphia defenders ignored him on the perimeter all evening. And yet, he did not hesitate.
Hart splashed in three 3-pointers in the final six minutes of a 111-104 victory, which handed the Knicks a 1-0 lead in their first-round playoff series. He finished Game 1 with 22 points and 13 rebounds, including a 4-of-8 performance from long range.
Four 3-point makes are his most in a game since February of last year.
BIG SHOT. JOSH HART 👌 pic.twitter.com/U0R1baxNdO
— NEW YORK KNICKS (@nyknicks) April 21, 2024
“He was a monster,” head coach Tom Thibodeau said.
It was no coincidence. Hart knew the Sixers’ blueprint and became determined to prepare for it.
Shortly after those two March games, he made a vow.
“Maybe I should just — whenever I catch it, it touches my hands, just throw it up,” he said later that week. “I think I’d be a little better.”
So in the six days between the Knicks’ final regular-season game and their playoff opener, that’s just what he practiced.
Because the Play-In Tournament would determine their first-round opponent, the Knicks didn’t know they would welcome the Sixers until Wednesday. Yet, that didn’t stop Hart from prep. Philadelphia historically dares Hart to shoot, but so do the Miami Heat, who also had a chance at the No. 7 seed. It meant six days of Hart training his jumper.
“This whole week was just getting up shots, pre-practice, post-practice,” Hart said.
You know it’s an important time for the Knicks when Hart, whose teammates tease him about being “the worst practice player” they’ve ever been around, is returning to the facility in the evenings. At least for one night, it paid off, especially when it mattered most.
With only five minutes to go and the shot clock winding down in a hard-fought possession, he pulled up from the top of the key to drain a triple and extend the Knicks’ lead to 4 points. Three minutes later, he nailed another 3 from the right wing. Only a minute after that and with the shot clock nearing zero once again, he rose from the same spot for a frantic, spread-legged jumper that swished through the net, growing New York’s lead to 7 points with 60 seconds to go.
He sank his final three 3s after beginning the night 1-of-5 from deep.
As the Sixers drifted, Hart’s mind never did.
“In the regular season, I think I shot like 30 percent (from 3), so it’s a smart game plan,” Hart said. “For me, it’s just continue to take shots. I made my first one and missed my next four. And normally I would have just been hesitant. But just continue to shoot, continue to shoot. Make them respect me.”
The Sixers must respect what the Knicks did Saturday — and not just because Hart got hot late. New York’s top player, its sole remaining All-Star, Jalen Brunson, was the coldest shooter on the floor, and yet it didn’t hold the group back.
Brunson went for 22 points, seven rebounds and seven assists but made just eight of his 26 field goal attempts and turned the ball over five times.
After a season of Brunson brushing any of the Knicks’ problems off his shoulder, the role players, including Hart and all three bench players in Thibodeau’s eight-man rotation, are the ones who filled in the gaps.
Miles “Deuce” McBride, given the circumstances, churned out the biggest performance of his career, going for 21 points, three rebounds and four assists off the bench. His energy, which followed a sluggish Knicks start that launched the Sixers to an early 13-point lead, changed the vibe of the night.
He defended 76ers star Tyrese Maxey for much of the way. During the second quarter, which the Knicks won by 21, McBride alone outscored Philadelphia 13-12. He hit 5 of 7 3-point attempts. His presence, and this is not hyperbole, represented a 67-point swing for the Knicks, who outscored the Sixers by 37 during the 28 minutes McBride played. Philadelphia won the 20 minutes he was on the bench by 30.
It didn’t hurt that he shared so much time alongside Mitchell Robinson, who looked the healthiest he has since returning from ankle surgery in March. Robinson jostled with reigning MVP Joel Embiid, outdoing the 7-footer on the boards, especially after Embiid tweaked his already-injured left knee in the second quarter only for a more hobbled version of himself to return in the second half.
Robinson finished with 8 points, 12 rebounds and four blocks off the bench. Maybe most importantly, he played 30 minutes, his highest total since before undergoing surgery in December.
“This is the playoffs. It’s a dogfight,” Robinson said. “You gotta go out there and just — you gotta fight for your life.”
This is the vision of the Knicks, a team that doesn’t have a surefire second option and instead relies on a committee of No. 2s.
Ask them who is Brunson’s sidekick, and they’ll repeat the same mantra, that on any given night, it could be anyone.
It could be Bojan Bogdanovic subbing in as the first reserve to enter and hitting a couple of 3-pointers to jump-start the offense. It could be McBride throwing in 3 after 3 or Robinson rejecting shots he never would have gotten to only a week ago when he was fresh off describing his conditioning as “low as s—.”
One second-quarter block occurred at an altitude to which few can venture. Robinson flailed with two arms, tipped a Maxey floater to himself and, as he was gliding out of bounds, rocketed the ball off Maxey, who was standing with two feet in the camera row. The swat occurred 10 minutes into a period during which Robinson had yet to rest.
The conditioning seems to be no longer low — nor are the chances of any Knicks regular popping up to help Brunson.
After all, it could be OG Anunoby or another one of the starters, such as Isaiah Hartenstein or Donte DiVincenzo, who both sat for the fourth quarter of Saturday’s win as their backups led the team to victory. It could be Bogdanovic or McBride or Robinson. Or it could be Hart who snags rebounds, makes hustle plays and shoots his 3s with no hesitation, just because he thought so much about not thinking anymore.
“We’ve been on (Brunson’s) shoulders all season,” Hart said. “And when he struggled, that’s when we had to pick up.”
(Photo: Elsa / Getty Images)
