The New York Knicks are now one win away from completing a second-round sweep of the Philadelphia 76ers after taking down Philly 108-94 on Friday night at Xfinity Mobile Arena.
Joel Embiid returned to the lineup after missing Game 2 of the Eastern Conference semifinal series with ankle and hip injuries, finishing with 18 points, six rebounds and five assists, but New York’s duo of Jalen Brunson and Mikal Bridges proved too much to overcome.
Brunson once again controlled the pace for the Knicks, finishing with 33 points, five rebounds and nine assists, while Bridges added 23 points of his own.
Philadelphia looked in control early and even built a 12-point lead, but the Knicks answered with multiple scoring runs that completely shifted the momentum as Knicks fans in attendance in Philly cheered them on.
Young star Tyrese Maxey added 17 points and seven assists while Kelly Oubre Jr. led all Sixers scorers with 22.
Now facing elimination, the 76ers will try to avoid the 17th playoff sweep in franchise history — the second-most all-time — when the series returns to Philadelphia for Game 4 on Sunday.
Here are the biggest takeaways heading into Game 4.
Knicks crash glass, Philly’s party
The Knicks don’t miss a ton of shots, so when they do, it’s best to make sure you get the rebound.
The 76ers did not.
New York grabbed 13 offensive rebounds and had 20-plus second-chance points en route to a 3-0 lead. Karl-Anthony Towns led the way with four offensive rebounds, and four other players had at least two. Crashing the offensive glass was the only offense the Knicks could generate early on as the 76ers got out to a huge lead to start the game.
During the regular season, New York ranked sixth in the NBA in offensive rebounds per game and seventh in second-chance points per game. Going into Game 3, the Knicks ranked just 13th of all playoff teams in offensive rebounds per game but were second in second-chance points. That means that when they do miss, they’re still ending possessions with points.
Philadelphia has been a terrible rebounding team all season, and it’s hard to see how the 76ers aren’t swept come Sunday if New York continues to dominate the glass.
If the Knicks are going to continue to score second-chance points at this clip, it’s going to be hard for anyone to beat them. This is a team that can win in many different ways, as Game 3 showed. — James Edwards III, Knicks beat writer
Knicks play with grit and Hart
Josh Hart plays basketball as if his headband were on fire. He hurtles his body through the air as if shot out of one of those T-shirt cannons, and he is willing to pay the price of a crash landing. Better yet, Hart will do all these things while playing hurt, in this case with an injured left thumb.
He got an X-ray on it before Game 3. “It wasn’t broken,” Hart said, and that was that. He played a relentless style of ball because that’s the only kind he knows how to play.
Hart had four points and four rebounds in the first three and a half minutes Friday, and yet, he was still taking social-media grief for his offensive flaws. Hey, he’s hardly a perfect player. The 76ers had Embiid cover him for a reason. But at 31, in his ninth season, Hart provides a ferocity on both sides of the ball required from a legitimate championship contender. He doesn’t care about his injury — he said it’s something he’ll revisit in the offseason — and he sure wasn’t going to sit out with OG Anunoby (hamstring) already sidelined.
And oh, by the way, Hart added of the 76ers: “They got somebody on their team who played through it and won a championship.” Kyle Lowry, fellow Villanova man, did indeed lead the Toronto Raptors to the 2019 title while his left thumb was barking at him.
Hart finished with 12 points and 11 rebounds in a decisive victory that made this a 3-0 series and put the Knicks on the brink of a second straight trip to the Eastern Conference finals and another shot at the franchise’s first appearance in the NBA Finals since 1999. Hart would’ve fit in with those ’90s Knicks. He plays with that level of toughness and grit. — Ian O’Connor, senior writer
Sixers miss on second chances
It’s hard to advance deep into the playoffs when you don’t rebound the basketball defensively and haven’t all season. Yes, you might have some pockets of time where you can clean things up a bit. But when you are bad at something for 82 games, you just aren’t going to magically change stripes.
Game 3 was won in the first half by the Knicks and lost by the 76ers because the Knicks outworked their counterparts on the glass.
They came up with one offensive rebound after another. They came up with one second-chance point after another. Every rebound that turned into a make whipped a heavily present New York crowd into a frenzy. The 76ers mitigated a lot of the damage in a first-round win over the Boston Celtics, because the Celtics were smaller and less dynamic.
Even so, Philly had issues in the first half of the series. The 76ers just cleaned it up a bit over the second half of the series. There’s your pocket of time. Against New York, this flaw hung heavy and exposed the Sixers. As a result, this series has turned into a rout, and Philadelphia will have some real searching to do in the offseason. — Tony Jones, Sixers beat writer
George and lead vanish for 76ers
Not even nine minutes into Game 3, Paul George had accumulated 15 points. He was nailing 3-pointers and taking Knicks off the dribble. The former All-Star looked like a current one, and his team followed his lead, going up double-digits right out of the gate.
Then New York switched around its defense, placing Bridges on George. George, in turn, went absent. He started to clank. And clank. The Knicks climbed. They tied the game in the second quarter, then went up double-digits themselves. All while George went errant. After beginning the game 6-of-8 from the field, he missed 10 consecutive shots.
The Sixers never led after the first quarter. Such has been life for Philadelphia in this series. Just when the Sixers seem like they have a chance, that chance vanishes. — Fred Katz, senior NBA writer
