Karl-Anthony Towns scored 31 points and Jalen Brunson added 30, including 12 in the fourth quarter, to give the visiting New York Knicks a 118-116 victory over the Detroit Pistons on Thursday in Game 3 of their Eastern Conference first-round playoff series.
OG Anunoby put up 22 points for the Knicks, who hold a 2-1 lead heading into Game 4 of the best-of-seven series on Sunday in Detroit.
“It’s playoff basketball,” Knicks coach Tom Thibodeau said. “We have guys who have been in a lot of big games. We’ve been a good road team all year, so I think we understand what goes into winning. And then, you know, we had disappointment from the loss in Game 2. So, I thought the readiness to play was very good.”
Brunson, who averaged 35.5 points in the first two games, also had nine assists and seven rebounds in Game 3.
Cade Cunningham and Tim Hardaway Jr. led Detroit with 24 points apiece, and Cunningham dished out a game-high 11 assists. Dennis Schroder scored 18 points for the Pistons, who have not won a home playoff game since May 2008.
“It’s frustrating for a bunch of different reasons,” Pistons coach J.B. Bickerstaff said. “I thought in the second half we played well enough to win the game.”
Detroit started out the second half with aggressive play to erase a 13-point halftime deficit and climb within 72-71 with 6:43 left in the third quarter. New York then clamped down on defense and held the Pistons without a basket over the last 4:23 of the quarter, producing a 93-83 edge at the period’s end.
The Pistons made a late run in the fourth quarter to cut it to 116-113 on Hardaway’s 3-pointer with 5.8 seconds left. Brunson then split a pair of free throws with 3.5 seconds remaining to put New York up 117-113.
Following a quick 3-pointer by Tobias Harris and a foul on an inbounds play, Brunson then split another pair of free throws with just under a second left to seal the win.
Knicks guard Josh Hart said of his team’s reaction to a Game 2 defeat, “We’re not surprised. I feel like we’ve been that team all year in terms of responding and bouncing back after losses.”
The first quarter was chippy and included multiple technical fouls and a flagrant foul. Brunson picked up the flagrant foul when his hand made contact with Hardaway’s face on a 3-point attempt and knocked him to the ground.
Nearly five minutes later, Pistons center Paul Reed and Knicks forward Mitchell Robinson were assessed double technical fouls and Towns received a technical foul for a shoving incident.
New York led by six after one quarter, then closed with a 23-6 spurt to build a 66-53 halftime lead. Anunoby had 18 points and Towns logged 17 before the break, while Hardaway paced Detroit with 18 points.
Addressing the mood in the Detroit locker room postgame, Bickerstaff said, “Our guys are too committed to one another. We’re not results driven. We’ll show up Sunday. We’re gonna lay it on the line. We’re gonna fight like hell and see what happens.”
–Field Level Media
