114-103 over the Knicks<\/a> on Thursday.<\/p>\nAcross the Eastern Conference, size has become the baseline, not a team-by-team luxury. Derrick White, a lanky 6-4, is the smallest piece in Boston\u2019s switchable machine with the smaller Payton Pritchard adding pop off the bench. Cade Cunningham, at 6-5, operates as Detroit\u2019s \u201csmallest\u201d player in its healthy starting five. Even the Atlanta Hawks deploy lineups with 6-7 Dyson Daniels functioning as the smallest player on the floor.<\/p>\n
Length is no longer positional. It\u2019s foundational.<\/p>\n
The Knicks have gone the other way.<\/p>\n
They\u2019ve doubled down on small guards in a league that is supersizing at every position. Jalen Brunson, listed at 6-2, plays 35 minutes a night. The remaining minutes at point guard are split between Jose Alvarado (6-foot), Tyler Kolek (6-2), Miles McBride (6-2), or Jordan Clarkson (6-5), who isn\u2019t a traditional floor general.<\/p>\n
There are workarounds. Josh Hart (6-5) and Mikal Bridges (6-6) can initiate offense. In Mike Brown\u2019s offense, the roles of players one through four are interchangeable.<\/p>\n
But when the Knicks put a true point guard on the floor, they are conceding size \u2014 by design.<\/p>\n
That tradeoff has always existed. It\u2019s always been exposed.<\/p>\n
But more and more teams are now rolling out lineups with no one shorter than 6-6 \u2014 groups built to switch everything, smother space, and turn size into pressure at every level of the floor.<\/p>\n
The Knicks, by contrast, are asking skill, game plan discipline \u2014 and, of course, Brunson\u2019s brilliance \u2014 to solve a structural problem.<\/p>\n
The results have still been strong.<\/p>\n
The Knicks are on pace to surpass Tom Thibodeau\u2019s 51-win mark from last season \u2014 already the franchise\u2019s best since Carmelo Anthony\u2019s 54-win campaign in 2013. They\u2019re doing it in Brown\u2019s first year at the helm, following Thibodeau\u2019s dismissal after the franchise\u2019s first Eastern Conference Finals appearance in a quarter century.<\/p>\n
But the bar has changed.<\/p>\n
As owner James Dolan said in January, this season is about one thing: an NBA Finals appearance. Anything short of that \u2014 in an Eastern Conference thinned by injury \u2014 risks being viewed as a missed opportunity. Or worse, a reason to re-evaluate.<\/p>\n
Because the window won\u2019t look like this forever.<\/p>\n
Tyrese Haliburton will return. Jayson Tatum will be fully healthy. Detroit is building confidence as a rising contender. Cleveland, already aggressive, could remain in the mix for another star. Miami is always one move away. The Wizards will spawn with an All-Star duo (Trae Young and Anthony Davis) after years in the lottery.<\/p>\n
And now, the Hornets are coming. The path won\u2019t get easier.<\/p>\n
This might be the cleanest runway the Knicks will get, which is what makes the inconsistency harder to ignore.<\/p>\n
The record says one thing. The eye test says another. And the gap tends to show up against teams built with the very blueprint the Knicks are betting against.<\/p>\n
Take Charlotte. The Hornets entered as the East\u2019s ninth seed yet were the most complete team the Knicks had faced in weeks. And the Hornets, if they continue to ride this hot streak, could see the Knicks in a No. 2 vs. No. 7 or No. 3 vs. No. 6 first-round playoff series.<\/p>\n
Another test is coming.<\/p>\n
The reigning champion Oklahoma City Thunder are up next, with 6-6 Shai Gilgeous-Alexander orchestrating the offense from the point. Even their \u201csmaller\u201d guards \u2014 Cason Wallace and Lu Dort \u2014 bring physicality and defensive bite.<\/p>\n
Teams are taking the new NBA model and running wild with it. Teams except the Knicks, that is, who are betting on the engine responsible for fueling the franchise\u2019s rise from the ashes of perpetual lottery seasons.<\/p>\n
Because Brunson is the kind of leader you trust \u2014 unquestionably \u2014 to carry you as far as he can.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s the gamble.<\/p>\n
The Knicks have built size everywhere else. They can play double-big with Karl-Anthony Towns and Mitchell Robinson. They can switch with OG Anunoby, Mikal Bridges and Mohamed Diawara. They can toggle lineups and cover ground.<\/p>\n
But they are smaller at the point of attack \u2014 oftentimes, significantly.<\/p>\n
And in a league where size is becoming the entry fee to contention, the Knicks are tasking a smaller guard with delivering the biggest prize.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s nothing new. Neither are the way defenses are guarding New York\u2019s All-Star guard and write-in mayoral candidate.<\/p>\n
The stakes? That\u2019s a different story. Because in New York it\u2019s Finals appearance or bust. And if they can\u2019t win it in this wide-open of a race, there\u2019s no telling when the next opportunity will come.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Brandon Miller is the smallest player in the Charlotte Hornets\u2019 starting five. He stands 6-5. Charlotte\u2019s point guard,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":684635,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3777],"tags":[7,46,684,473,3878,1409,141,685,288,304,6,297,4323],"class_list":["post-684634","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-charlotte-hornets","tag-basketball","tag-celtics","tag-charlotte","tag-charlotte-hornets","tag-charlottehornets","tag-eastern-conference","tag-guard","tag-hornets","tag-jalen-brunson","tag-knicks","tag-nba","tag-pistons","tag-size"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/116308484010575898","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/684634","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=684634"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/684634\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/684635"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=684634"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=684634"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=684634"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}