{"id":681278,"date":"2026-03-27T03:07:35","date_gmt":"2026-03-27T03:07:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/681278\/"},"modified":"2026-03-27T03:07:35","modified_gmt":"2026-03-27T03:07:35","slug":"hornets-end-knicks-winning-streak-114-103-in-potential-playoff-preview","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/681278\/","title":{"rendered":"Hornets end Knicks winning streak, 114-103, in potential playoff preview"},"content":{"rendered":"

Who needs the Detroit Pistons<\/a> when you have the Charlotte Hornets<\/a>? The Knicks, in pursuit of their first NBA Finals appearance since 1999, would be better suited avoiding both.<\/p>\n

The proof in the pudding was on display at the Spectrum Center, where the Hornets snapped the Knicks\u2019 seven-game winning streak \u2014 against losing teams plus the depleted Golden State Warriors \u2014 in embarrassing fashion on Thursday, a 114-103 victory for the Eastern Conference\u2019s No. 9 seed.<\/p>\n

In a potential first-round playoff preview.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s a likely scenario: Knicks owning home-court advantage in a Round 1 showdown over young and fun Hornets, who\u2019ve been supercharged by the arrival of Duke\u2019s Kon Kneuppel, selected No. 4 overall in last June\u2019s NBA Draft. Kneuppel, who appears to be headlining the two-man Rookie of the Year race (Dallas\u2019 Cooper Flagg is the other award hopeful), hit six 3s for 26 points to help the Hornets build a lead that ballooned to as large as 21 in the fourth quarter.<\/p>\n

And if the Knicks are going to fare any better in a matchup \u2014 or a series \u2014 against the Hornets, they\u2019ll need better performances from Karl-Anthony Towns, who scored 20 or more points in seven of his prior eight games, before playing just 22 minutes in Charlotte on Thursday.<\/p>\n

Towns finished with 13 points on five-of-eight shooting from the field and snared just three rebounds. The Knicks were outscored by 18 points in their All-Star center\u2019s minutes on the floor. And they were out-rebounded by the Hornets, who started Moussa Diabate at the five, by 19, a never-before-seen 43-24 margin on the glass against a Knicks team with two premier rebounders at center (plus another playing the forward spot in Josh Hart<\/a>).<\/p>\n

The Knicks got next to nothing \u2014 17 points \u2014 from their bench as a whole, the same amount of points Charlotte\u2019s backup point guard Coby White scored on Thursday.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, LaMelo Ball scored 20 points, and Charlotte\u2019s Brandon Miller added 21, both making four 3s on eight attempts on the night. The Hornets made 16 3s on 41 attempts against a Knicks defense struggling to rotate to open shooters.<\/p>\n

Jalen Brunson finished with a team-high 26 points on 10-of-23 shooting from the field. OG Anunoby added 17 points on five-of-nine shooting from 3-point range, and Mikal Bridges scored 14 points on 50% shooting from the field.<\/p>\n

The Hornets, who have not been to the playoffs since 2016, have now won 23 of their last 29 games and are riding a five-game winning streak. They have completed one of the best turnarounds in recent NBA memory, owning the league\u2019s third-worst record last season.<\/p>\n

The Hornets are now standing out from the pack of teams clustered in the Eastern Conference\u2019s Play-In Tournament race. Charlotte is now tied with the Miami Heat for the East\u2019s No. 8 seed. The Hornets are one game behind seventh-place Miami, 1.5 games behind the Toronto Raptors in sixth place, and two games behind the No. 5-seeded Atlanta Hawks \u2014 with nine games left on the schedule.<\/p>\n

Charlotte\u2019s schedule is stiff to end the season: The Hornets play the Boston Celtics<\/a> twice and the Phoenix Suns, Minnesota Timberwolves and Detroit Pistons once.<\/p>\n

They will also face the Knicks in their season finale at Madison Square Garden on April 12.<\/p>\n

The Knicks fell from a half-game to a full game behind the second-place Celtics. They have a 2.5-game cushion over No. 4 Cleveland.<\/p>\n

Which leaves two scenarios in which the Knicks and Hornets can meet in the first round, and even more heightened stakes for the rematch in the finale: If the Knicks move up to No. 2 and the Hornets move up to No. 7 or 8 by the end of the regular season and win the Seven-Eight Game, there will be a New York-Charlotte first-round playoff series. The other scenario involves the Knicks remaining at No. 3 while the Hornets win the majority of their remaining games and catch No. 6 Toronto.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Who needs the Detroit Pistons when you have the Charlotte Hornets? The Knicks, in pursuit of their first…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":681279,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[3768],"tags":[7,685,563,304,6,1136,191,3810,3806],"class_list":{"0":"post-681278","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-hornets","10":"tag-karl-anthony-towns","11":"tag-knicks","12":"tag-nba","13":"tag-new-york","14":"tag-new-york-knicks","15":"tag-newyork","16":"tag-newyorkknicks"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/116298940651385712","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/681278","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=681278"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/681278\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/681279"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=681278"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=681278"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=681278"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}