NEW YORK - The New York Knicks lost 103-100 to the Oklahoma City Thunder on Wednesday, facing a tough challenge from the reigning NBA champions. This was the Knicks' first success over a top-seeded Western Conference club, having already failed to defeat the East's number Q seed, the Detroit Pistons, three times.
Despite some notable losses, the Knicks have performed better than last season against top teams under new head coach Mike Brown. The coach did not describe the game as important, but stressed the importance of learning from the match post-match.
"Seeing what they did, how they did it, why we shot 28% from three. Why this happened, why that happened. It's a great learning experience," Brown told reporters at Madison Square Garden. "It doesn't matter if you - you want to win. But it doesn't matter if you win or lose. And seeing the competitiveness from our guys was something I love, as well as the physicality."
The process-to-results mentality fits the coach, who uses the regular season as an information-gathering period to get the most out of his personnel in the postseason. He has often said that the Knicks' regular season losses are treated as learning opportunities, not failed opportunities to compete.
No matter how one spins it, the Knicks' margin of error in the playoffs continues to shrink. Will these regular season losses become a topic of discussion if the team fails to deliver in the postseason?
The pressure to outperform last season's Eastern Conference Finals appearance was already intense prior to the season. And with six weeks left in the NBA playoffs, it looks like it's only going to keep on going.
Final preview? Brown, Daigneault both play it cool
Brown downplayed the significance of the matchup after the game, telling reporters that he believed the regular season "statement games" were contradictory.
The coach said, "I don't believe in statement games just because in the playoffs, it's a different season, you know? ... They're one of the elite teams defensively. You can probably get more from that film than a team that might be 29th defensively."
Mark Daigneault shared a similar sentiment before the game, telling reporters that the Knicks are a "great test" for his Thunder and crediting New York with being one of the best groups in the league. Asked by the coach if he thought of games like Wednesday as a potential Finals preview, he quickly replied that it was still too early in March to have any thoughts about playoff matchups.
Brown clearly values the opportunity for teams like the Thunder to test his Knicks' ability. However, his zoomed-out approach to these games, viewing them as data points that span a long season as opposed to the confrontation of individual battles, is representative of the exact philosophical shift the Knicks' front office wanted from their coaching change.
New York will travel to Oklahoma City in late March for the teams' second and final regular season matchup. After this, one thing is clear whether Daigneault wants to accept it or not. If these teams meet again, it will be in the 2026 NBA Finals.
