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2025-26 Game Thread: Knicks vs. Trailblazers

I was going to make a joke about how wounded the Blazers were, but then Timelord and Avdija were both cleared to play, so, well, never mind!

Anyhow, the Knicks host the Trailblazers with a really good chance of keeping the good times coming!

Let’s go, Knicks!

Winning five is almost eight, so that would be really great!

205 replies on “2025-26 Game Thread: Knicks vs. Trailblazers”

The defense is good, but these guys still haven’t learned how to play together on offense.

hopefully whoever comes off the bench can help get things moving…

seems like jalen is sitting back on offense to start this game…

if this current rotation (jalen, josh, shamet, mo, mitch) equals KAT, OG, and mikal running with tyler at the point – chef’s kiss to the coach…

7-0 run immediately after KAT sits. It’s funny.

Brunson plays freer without KAT. It’s almost like he is not overthinking how to pass him the ball.

Hart’s already done some dumb shit, but when he flies out on the break, I am absolutely one hundred percent confident it’s a bucket.

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I don’t know how Brunson manages this, but I think they scored in every possession with Diawara, Hart and Mitch on the court. Two shooters!

This is fun so far. Watching it on Portland TV, the announcers have pointed out that Caleb Love is on a three-point heater…

Who cares about Brunson’s offense he’s still one of the worst defensive guards in the association…

Yeah, Brunson is like an efficient Iverson. Surround him with a bunch of junkyard dogs and he can keep an offense afloat by himself.

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Mo D getting Yabu’s usual 1st qtr 3 minute shift. Best 1st qtr of 2026. Can it be extended to a full game cruise?

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Clingan seems like two buck Mitch

sorry but you can’t be a former golden circle member of team aldrich and call clingan store brand

Mo D is so damn raw, but he’s also so much more fun to watch than the alternative.

Kolek!!

I don’t really believe that about Clingan but Mitch is my guy and people compare them.

OG swallowed Jrue whole there

Tonight’s opponent is not the team to draw serious conclusions from, but most of this half has been the epitomy of basketball dominance.

no luck required raven…MB just has to figure out how to keep jalen and KAT as far away as possible from each other out on the court…

yep, so it now seems…

Did anyone else notice how much taller Mo looked than OG when they were walking off the court?

Interesting. Only shooters out there are Shamet and KAT.

I guess I forgot Hart…

you know, you could also just like enjoy the game, grab some food, kick and/or pet the dog, smash the sofa, do drugs (if that’s your thing, selective judgement here always), pester your partner, do some chores, write a post or two on some obscure basketball blog…

endless possibilities that do not include some kind of remorse (for not having a more worthy opponent)…whatever…

Good job by Mike Brown getting Portland back into the game by going with this stupid lineup.

Good job by Mike Brown getting Portland back into the game by going with this stupid lineup.

They are not back (yet!) but, yes, Brown started experimenting with lineups again.

I’m with BBA on this one. It’s not relaxing, it’s just a bad lineup out there.

I was curious about this and looked it up–among all players averaging 15+ PPG, Mikal is 89th out of 89 in free throw rate. It’s actually kind of impressive in a sense because he can clearly score, and efficiently enough at that, without being fouled, but also come on man that’s low hanging fruit!

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Not to defend the coach, but repeatedly leaving 3pt shooters wide open must have to do with effort.

Much like Hart on the break, a Mitch offensive rebound and spray-out to Brunson for the three also feels like money each time.

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“Bridges will draw a foul” – what language is that? Those words are so unfamiliar to me.

Kolek with two rebounds and zero assists. In fact we’re low on assists overall (aiming for less than 20 for the game…).

They caught up on the boards the last few minutes. That’s what’s fueling them. We were destroying them for a quarter and a half.

Only this Knicks team can make you hate them despite having a 10 pt halftime lead.

Hard to disagree with Clyde’s, ” They lack a killer instinct.”

Here i am, for the best part (2nd half), although as we have a 10pt lead maybe they start slow, they seem to just put the effort when they think it’s needed.

At least we got a mariachi band as halftime entertainment…doing a journey song…wtf

Was thinking the same thing 😉

The Knicks didn’t close the half well but still have the upper hand and it all depends on them and how focused they will stay after the break. Offense comes and goes but it was overall fine. We kind of shut down the engines after going up by 25 and there were plenty of bad plays on both ends of the court. I didn’t like Hart’s defense very much. He was slow to react on rotations, and also got passed by way to easily on some occasions. Also: we need to keep rebounding well. We didn’t do that in Q2.

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Silly end to the half…

Who is the play by play guy tonight? Same guy as last night? Like him still

I really find it crazy after all of last season that this is Brown’s preferred starting lineup.

So they are running the starting lineup that doesn’t really work into the ground

Why hire a new coach?

Also they’ve lost both Klingon and Advil in that first half.

They came into the game with several players not being available or being questionable. It will be a shame if we don’t beat them. It’s entirely up to us.

I mean the Knicks aren’t gonna lose this game just a matter of will they blow them out or are we gonna have to annoyingly sweat it out in the 4th quarter.

You know KAT sucks cuz he can’t even have a “shut Hubert up” game. It’s just one steaming pile of shit after another.

Josh Hart would be hitting 80% of his threes right now if I’d been calling him out like this.

‘Shitty’ Towns with 16 rebounds not even halfway through the third quarter. Back down, Hubert.

I’m convinced KAT has decided he really wants to be liked, realizes that everyone loves Mitch, and figures he’ll just snag every rebound and miss every shot, just like Mitch.

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KAT seems to have changed his approach to the game and seems more focused on paint protection, rebounding, and passing. If true, I’m in. His shooting will come around sooner or later.

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KAT still has some kind of scoring yips but can’t fault his hustle tonight. At least he hasn’t totally checked out. It’s something.

That was fun watching Brunson going “Have to dunk it or I’ll get blocked,” “What if I blow the dunk,” then blows it all.

Portland announcers say the last Brunson dunk was 2024.

Mikal is having a 50/40/80 season with this level of defense, maybe they shouldn’t trade him for Jrue.

OG remains a terrible passer for alley oops.

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if msg can think quick there’s a great trivia question available. name all the active 2nd round picks with at least 10k points.

The Knicks play by play guy looks like he should have been calling the big game at the end of Hoosiers

The lead would be 30 if they could hit open corner 3s.

Very nice alley oop to end it.

39.4% after three quarters. No complains.

I’m still trying to figure out how Brunson bricked a point-blank layup. That was Shaqtin’ a Fool material

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I’m still trying to figure out how Brunson bricked a point-blank layup. That was Shaqtin’ a Fool material

I think like Raven said, he was thinking ‘dunk it,’ then ‘I’m not sure I can dunk it,’ then…finger roll in tribute of Patrick

I love when guys try to take it at Mitch… Good luck with that

Well, usually

Tyler Murray trying to start a conversation about the merits of drafting older players that Clyde clearly didn’t give a shit about was hilarious

1

Mitch Robinson has not been playing well by his standards tonight but it’s ok. Let him play well when we really need him.

Im curious to see if the defense will hold against a good offense. The Lakers should be a good test.

Blazers are 9th in the West at 23-25 so I wouldn’t say they suck but they’re obviously not very good.

Starting to wonder whether I could choreograph the Knicks City Dancers better than whoever they have

lots of great efforts including kat, but last two games og has been the best player on the floor on either team by a lot

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KAT had a commanding presence tonight. I don’t remember to have seen that from him before. For old timers who are soccer fans, KAT looked like Franz Beckenbauer tonight, der Kaiser. I am happy with that.

I really think we may have something in Diawara. Very raw, but lots of skills. Give him a couple years to become more fluid and he could be a big contributor.

1

Dillon Jones looks out of shape.

He just had a great game in Westchester

We really need to take care of business Sunday. Losing to the Lakers would be a huge downer after this recent stretch of good play.

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Have you ceded your OG short yet, Hubert?

No but I sold off some shares for a huge profit a few weeks ago when it was at an all time high.

Can’t fight two battles at once, though, so you can have this one.

Mo will hopefully benefit greatly from an offseason spent in the weight room. Turning 21 will probably help too.

Not to pull a Strat on Frank hot take here, but he looks like he grew an inch since we drafted him.

Meanwhile this announcer won me over when Clyde said, the Blazers have been in town a few days, and you know what that can mean with a young team, and he replied, there are a lot of great museums in New York

One thing I have to compliment Brown for is that there are lots of offensive possessions where the ball doesn’t hit the floor very much. Very pleasing to watch when the ball is being whipped around, even if they overpass sometimes.

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Mo moves with an athletic fluidity that can benefit from a little force. Not too much. He is exactly who we want to grow.

If Mo’s shot continues to develop (It was a major reason why he wasn’t taken earlier) and he can become a bit more disciplined on D (OG is a great role model for him, and to a lesser degree, so are Mikal and Josh) he can be an impact player. He’s got things you can’t teach, most notably a good handle, court vision, and finishing ability with both hands. He doesn’t shy away from physicality even though he gets moved around because he’s not physically developed yet.

To me, Mo is clearly the most promising guy they’ve taken in the last couple of years. He does some silly things, but there’s a lot of promise there.

Shades of January 2024 Knicks. Kolek looks like he has his mojo back.

We won convincing but the Knicks have one of the worst whistles in the league. I know I may sound biased but a lot of drives and plays that other team get the refs simply don’t call for the Knicks. It super frustrating to watch

We somehow went from 9 assists at halftime to 28.

Meanwhile, Today’s Huk Count with 18 pts and 18 rebounds per 36. Also 18 fouls…

Brown mentioned it in response to a postgame question, but Brunson has played pretty damn good D in this stretch.

For two consecutive games KAT has focused on rebounding and defending and letting the game come to him on O. Committing only one foul while grabbing 42 rebounds, a lot of them tough ones in traffic, is very impressive. I also don’t recall him trailing the play by 10 seconds after a drive and flop.

Suns are no joke

Suns owner turned around his image in one season
Good coach, good roster

The Mikal,OG, Diawara pairing brings a bunch of defense with switch ability . It was cool to see.

Brown mentioned it in response to a postgame question, but Brunson has played pretty damn good D in this stretch.

For two consecutive games KAT has focused on rebounding and defending and letting the game come to him on O. Committing only one foul while grabbing 42 rebounds, a lot of them tough ones in traffic, is very impressive. I also don’t recall him trailing the play by 10 seconds after a drive and flop.

Brunson’s defensive improvement has been clear to the eye test – a lot more fight, more effort to jump screens, more persistence. And this version of KAT is OK – better on D, and as you say, letting the offense come to him more. There was one pay where he basically didn’t get back, but it was only one. Baby steps.

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