The New York Knicks reached the Eastern Conference finals for the first time in 25 years and ended the one-year NBA title reign of the Boston Celtics with astonishing ease, rolling to a 119-81 victory in Game 6 on Friday night.
Jalen Brunson and OG Anunoby each scored 23 points for the Knicks, who will face the Indiana Pacers, the same team they met in their last conference finals appearance in 2000. Game 1 is Wednesday night in New York.
The Knicks hadn’t won a playoff series on their home floor since the 1999 East finals. So the celebrating started late in the one-sided first half inside Madison Square Garden and was sure to carry on deep into the night around the arena.
Mikal Bridges scored 22 points and Karl-Anthony Towns had 21 for the Knicks, whose 38-point margin of victory was their largest in a postseason game.
Jaylen Brown scored 20 points for the Celtics, who lost leading scorer Jayson Tatum to a ruptured Achilles tendon in Game 4 but believed they still had enough to get it back to Boston for Game 7 and keep their title defense alive.
It was quickly clear that wasn’t happening.
The Celtics led by at least 14 in each of the first five games, but this time the Knicks started fast and kept pouring it on until Boston coach Joe Mazzulla began pulling his starters in the third quarter after the deficit reached 41 points.
The Knicks scored the first seven points of the second quarter to make it 33-20. New York blew it open with a 13-3 run that made it 49-27, a surge highlighted by 6-foot-1 guard Deuce McBride’s chasedown block of Derrick White’s shot that led to Josh Hart’s second straight basket while being fouled.
Ben Stiller and Lenny Kravitz shared a handshake and hug afterward along celebrity row, where the A-listers were standing and cheering much of the night, the same as the fans sitting near the top of the arena.
The Knicks led 64-37 at halftime, a 27-point lead that matched their biggest in a playoff game in the shot-clock era. They led the Lakers 69-42 in Game 7 of the 1970 NBA Finals, when Willis Reed’s return from injury sparked the Knicks to their first NBA title.
There was another three years later, but the Knicks have been shut out since and it didn’t appear this would be the year that could end after the Knicks were a combined 0-8 against Cleveland and Boston, the two teams that finished above them in the East.
But they won’t have to worry about the Cavaliers and completely turned things around against the Celtics, overcoming 20-point deficits in the second halves of both games in Boston to open the series.
Hart finished with 10 points, 11 rebounds and 11 assists for the Knicks.
Reporting by The Associated Press.
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