\u201cI wanted that s\u2013t so f\u2013king bad,\u201d said a visibly galled Minott, who had 22 points on a career-best 6-for-9 from deep. \u201cEver since we\u2019ve been here, it\u2019s like every game is an away game. [Friday] was just the night to really just stick it to everybody, man. As an organization, as a team, to show people that we got s\u2013t here, yo.<\/p>\n
![\"Josh](\"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Josh-Minott-.jpg\")
Josh Minott, who scored 22 points off the bench, shoots a jumper over Jalen Brunson during the Nets\u2019 93-92 loss to the Knicks on March 20, 2026 at Barclays Center. Jason Szenes for New York Post<\/p>\n
\u201cMan, just a sea of blue, a sea of orange. Every game we play, it\u2019s a sea of the other team. And I saw it here when I was on the Celtics. But being here, it\u2019s like, I\u2019ve got nothing but respect for the real fans, the real Brooklyn fans. Shoutout to them, because I know it\u2019s tough being outnumbered every single game. But I really feel like what we have here isn\u2019t bulls\u2013t. We have pieces here. I\u2019ve seen it. That\u2019s what this \u2018rivalry\u2019 meant to me.\u201d<\/p>\n
Yes, Minott really used \u201cair quotes\u201d with his hands.<\/p>\n
The Nets (17-53) have dropped 14 straight in this series and haven\u2019t beaten the Knicks since Jan. 28, 2023. That includes getting routed 120-66 at the Garden on Jan. 21 and drilled 134-98 at home Nov. 9.<\/p>\n
But at least Friday they showed some pride. And some grit.<\/p>\n
Karl-Anthony Towns had 26 points and 15 rebounds and had more free-throw attempts (13) than the Nets did as a team (10). <\/p>\n
But Brooklyn swarmed and swiped and shoved and was physical with Towns in a first half that saw them lead 50-44.<\/p>\n
\u201cI played with KAT for 2 \u00bd years, man. I know him like this. He don\u2019t like physicality,\u201d Minott said. \u201cI love KAT, but he don\u2019t like physicality. That\u2019s my boy, too, but he don\u2019t like physicality. I hope this angers him, too. But yeah, we were real connected on bringing that physicality to him.\u201d<\/p>\n
![\"Karl-Anthony](\"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Karl-Anthony-Towns-3.jpg\")
Karl-Anthony Towns, who scored 26 points and grabbed 15 rebounds, drives past Nolan Traore during the Nets\u2019 loss to the Knicks at Barclays Center. Jason Szenes for New York Post<\/p>\n
The Nets led by as much as 45-32 with 3:55 left in the half on a 3-pointer by Ziaire Williams (17 points).<\/p>\n
They still led 59-55 before they gave up a 20-6 run to fall behind by 10.<\/p>\n
Down 84-70 on a Towns bucket with 9:34 to play, a bench unit of Minott and four rookies sparked a 17-0 run. <\/p>\n<\/p>\n
\t\t\t\t\t\t\tFollow all the basketball buzz in Brooklyn\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\tSign up for Inside the Nets by Brian Lewis, exclusively on Sports+.\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
\t\t\t\t\t\tThank you\n\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
They held the Knicks scoreless for 6:21, with Chaney Johnson, Ochai Agbaji and Malachi Smith \u2014 two two-way players and a 10-day contract player \u2014 playing feisty defense.<\/p>\n
But after rookie Nolan Traore (11 points, seven assists) put the Nets up 87-84 with 3:33 left, they gave up eight unanswered. Jalen Brunson put the Knicks up with consecutive buckets, and Brooklyn couldn\u2019t respond.<\/p>\n
The Nets (17-53) are third in the lottery odds, pulling within two games of Indiana and a half-game of Washington. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Don\u2019t think for a second the Nets didn\u2019t care about breaking their skid against the Knicks, and that…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":670321,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[3767],"tags":[7,670,247,3803,563,6,671,191,66],"class_list":{"0":"post-670320","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-brooklyn-nets","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-brooklyn","10":"tag-brooklyn-nets","11":"tag-brooklynnets","12":"tag-karl-anthony-towns","13":"tag-nba","14":"tag-nets","15":"tag-new-york-knicks","16":"tag-sports"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/670320","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=670320"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/670320\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/670321"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=670320"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=670320"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=670320"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}