INDIANAPOLIS — Tom Thibodeau can smell it, but he won’t inhale.
It’s been 14 years since the Knicks’ head coach last reached this point — nine playoff wins deep, one round away from the NBA Finals, still standing as one of the league’s last four teams. And yet here he is, measured as ever, not letting himself feel what’s so close he can taste it.
Staying even-keel is one of Thibodeau’s mantras. Don’t get too high in victory. Don’t get too low in defeat. One day after the Knicks stormed back from a 20-point hole — again — to win Game 3 over the Pacers, the head coach remained cool, calm and collected about his team’s success.
“I try not to get wrapped up in anything that’s personal. I think everything is team-oriented. And so, when you’re with a team, you wanna maximize all the opportunities that you do get, and you wanna try to get the most out of your group. And I think each day, when you have a committed group, that’s what you enjoy. You enjoy the challenge of it all,” he said on a Zoom conference call after a team film session Monday afternoon. “Each day, you’re gonna be tested in a different way, and if you love competition, this is the best for competition. So, we’re fortunate we have a great group of guys, and we work as hard as we can each and everyday. Sometimes, we fall short. The next day, come back with more determination to fix it and get better. And so, I think that’s where you get enjoyment. And when you’re with a good group of people that feel the team is the most important thing, that’s what makes it enjoyable.”
Jalen Brunson thinks a lot of the criticism his head coach gets is unwarranted. But this is the social media era where everyone has a voice. And in a market like New York City, every voice is amplified. Some say an old-school coach is stuck in his ways. Some say the Knicks would be better served with a new voice in the locker room. None of it penetrates what’s inside those walls: a close-knit Knicks team with its eyes on the prize.
“Yeah, absolutely, [the criticism is] definitely unfair. People are entitled to say and think what they want,” Brunson said on Monday. “For the most part, as a team as an organization, there’s always going to be a lot of noise, positive or negative. So it’s all about what we think and what we do. All about the work we put in, day in and day out. And trusting obviously our journey. So regardless of what people say we’re going to have each other’s backs.”
This is Thibodeau’s 10th playoff run in 13 years as an NBA head coach. He’s been part of a Finals team as an assistant in New York in 1999, won it all on the sidelines with the Celtics in 2008, and went back with Boston in 2010, losing to Kobe Bryant’s Lakers.
But he’s never made it to the NBA’s biggest stage as a head coach. Now, he’s three wins shy of the biggest moment of his career.
“He’s obviously been in a lot of battles. He’s been with different teams and had different successes with other teams. We haven’t really talked about it,” said Brunson. “Watching this man work tirelessly day-in and day-out, 364 days out of the year, he maybe takes one day off, [winning a title] would mean a lot. But I know he’s not thinking about that. I know he’s not thinking about what it would mean for him. He’s just thinking about what can we do better in Game 4.”
The Knicks made some key changes in Game 3, and they paid off.
Pacers coach Rick Carlisle said afterward that New York played more of its better defenders off the bench, and Brunson said what worked Sunday should be repeatable.
“I think obviously on the defensive side of the ball continue to fly around. And obviously we don’t want to have breakdowns, but when we do we’ve got to continue to fly and help each other out,” he said on Monday. Brunson also noted taking care of the ball prevents the Pacers from doing their damage in transition. “From an individual standpoint, just giving my team more opportunities to shoot the ball and score the ball instead of turning the ball over. I think that’ll be a key for us. Limiting them in transition. They’re obviously a great transition team and I mean when they’re open they knock down threes. So we’ve got to contest as many shots as possible.”
For OG Anunoby, the matchup carries a little extra weight.
He and Pascal Siakam were teammates on the 2019 Kawhi Leonard-led Toronto Raptors championship team. Now, they’re on opposite ends of a series with another Finals trip on the line.
“Pascal is a great player. So, just after [he scored 39 points in] Game 2, just trying to make it as difficult as possible. Maybe not help as much in certain situations and not give him easy looks or their shots,” Anunoby said after the Knicks’ film session on Monday. “Just try to make it as difficult as possible and force him into uncomfortable possessions. And then yeah, Pascal is one of my great friends in the league. We were very close as teammates. He’s a great player and a great person, but we’re competing right now.”
The Knicks have now played every type of playoff game.
They’ve been blown out. They’ve blown leads. They’ve climbed back from 20 and they’ve blown 14-point leads in less than three minutes. They’ve gutted out rock fights and lived through shootouts. They’ve lost at home and stolen games on the road. And now, they’re trying to become just the eighth team in NBA history to come back from an 0-2 deficit in the conference finals or later.
“Just knowing it’ll swing both ways. You’ll have a big win. You might have a tough loss,” said Anunoby. “But you know you just keep going. It’s best of seven, so just keep playing and know that’s how the playoffs go.”
Each game could be its own ESPN 30-for-30 documentary, but the Knicks are leaning into the wild nature of it all.
“It’s competition. It’s the playoffs. And in order to go through and do something special, you have to go through a lot of adversity, a lot of questioning mentally and internally if we’re going to do this,” said Brunson. “So it can make or break teams when you’re going through things like that. And I think obviously what we did last night [in Game 3] definitely helps us. We saw we were on the brink of it looking pretty dark for us. And the way we responded I think it brings us closer together.”