The latest update delivered a blow to the surging Knicks \u2014 who\u2019ve won four in a row and eight of their past nine games \u2014 ahead of their trip for the final portion of the league\u2019s in-season tournament. They went 0-3 without McBride during his previous absences this season before picking up a victory Tuesday, and in his fifth year the guard has averaged a career-best 11.6 points per game along with 2.6 rebounds, 2.5 assists and a 44.4 percent 3-point clip.<\/p>\n
![\"Miles](\"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/03f4855e7f5bb1aca433fb3a3b0edc4d.jpeg\"\/)
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Miles McBride is out at least another week. JASON SZENES\/ NY POST<\/p>\n
\u201cObviously, we miss him,\u201d point guard Jalen Brunson said after practice Thursday in Tarrytown. \u201cWe want him back. Gotta pick up a lot of slack on both sides of the ball without him being out there. He\u2019s able to do so much for us, and so definitely we need to fill that gap. We\u2019re just gonna have to do what we\u2019ve gotta do until he\u2019s back.\u201d<\/p>\n
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McBride has remained one of the Knicks\u2019 contract bargains, more than living up to the three-year, $13 million extension he signed nearly two years ago by providing strong minutes off the bench and starting \u2014 like he did for seven of the nine games OG Anunoby recently missed with a hamstring strain \u2014 when needed. But the Knicks will need to rely on Jordan Clarkson to fill McBride\u2019s role for at least the Vegas trip and adapt without their top two guards off the bench, as Landry Shamet injured his shoulder in late November and received a reevaluation timeline of four weeks. Second-year guard Tyler Kolek could be tasked with inheriting extra minutes too.<\/p>\n
Clarkson has been in this spot before. He won the league\u2019s Sixth Man of the Year award in 2020-21 while with the Jazz and has built a career on carving out roles off the bench, with his latest chapter unfolding with the Knicks after opting to chase a title as a 33-year-old. There have been highs, like his 24-point burst against the Heat on Nov. 14, and lows, like a seven-game stretch entering Tuesday when Clarkson finished with single-digit points five times and shot 30.8 percent from the field.<\/p>\n
But he\u2019s methodical until he gets to his spots, head coach Mike Brown said, and isn\u2019t \u201cgetting himself in trouble\u201d by relying on just one foot in the paint. If help defense collapses, Clarkson can dish passes. And he\u2019s embraced the necessary physicality on defense to survive as a small guard in the league and mesh with the Knicks system.<\/p>\n
\u201cI mean, he\u2019s definitely one of the best sixth men ever in our game,\u201d Brunson said of Clarkson. \u201cHe\u2019s won the award and the things he\u2019s been able to do in that role have been great. So I expect him just to come and be aggressive and be who he is. \u2026 So I don\u2019t see a drop-off. I just see the next-man-up mentality.\u201d<\/p>\n
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There wasn\u2019t much of a drop-off in Tuesday\u2019s win against the Raptors, when Clarkson contributed 12 points in 25 minutes off the bench. He has aced most of his first impressions to start his Knicks stint while working through any obstacles that materialized while adapting. His next task, though, will involve contributing on their biggest stage yet this season.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think it\u2019s a collective deal,\u201d Brown said of replacing McBride, \u201cbecause with Deuce out, too, Tyler\u2019s played a little bit more too. Again, not one person is gonna replace any other one person. It\u2019s gonna be done collectively, and Jordan\u2019s had a fantastic year for us. He\u2019s given us a huge spark coming off the bench.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Just as the Knicks got one key piece of their rotation back, they\u2019ll need to operate without another…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":468388,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3768],"tags":[7,288,423,2131,304,4988,2715,6,1136,191,3810,3806,741,760,1254],"class_list":{"0":"post-468387","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-york-knicks","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-jalen-brunson","10":"tag-jazz","11":"tag-jordan-clarkson","12":"tag-knicks","13":"tag-landry-shamet","14":"tag-miles-mcbride","15":"tag-nba","16":"tag-new-york","17":"tag-new-york-knicks","18":"tag-newyork","19":"tag-newyorkknicks","20":"tag-og-anunoby","21":"tag-the-knicks","22":"tag-tyler-kolek"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/115705122108885837","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/468387","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=468387"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/468387\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/468388"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=468387"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=468387"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=468387"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}