CHARLOTTE — The Knicks devoured the Hornets in a Thanksgiving Eve meal to maintain control of their NBA Cup destiny.
And while carving up Charlotte on Wednesday 129-101, Mike Brown’s new small-ball lineup looked good.
Historically good.
With Mitchell Robinson moving to the bench, the five Knicks starters all scored in double digits in the opening half of Wednesday’s cakewalk. It was the first time every Knick starter had at least 10 points at the break since at least the 1996-97 season — when those statistics were first tracked.
The reward was a 25-point lead at the break for the Knicks (11-6), and a Jalen Brunson breeze to the final buzzer in front of a heavy pro-Knicks crowd in Charlotte (4-14).
“I hate. I hate it,” Hornets forward Miles Bridges said of the Knicks fans invading his arena. “It happens when the Knicks come, the Lakers come. I hate it, but we didn’t do anything to shut them up.”
The Knicks, meanwhile, kept them cheering.
Brunson dropped a game-high 33 points on 14-of-28 shooting in 34 minutes.
Brown’s dominating lineup included Josh Hart and Miles McBride, both of whom shined in the first half.
Hart, in particular, was a force, ending the second quarter with 19 points on 7-of-9 shooting with four assists and four rebounds.
He scored just three points in the second half, but it was still an overwhelmingly positive performance.
Brown used the same lineup two nights earlier in Brooklyn, but Robinson was inactive because of an illness. The coach revealed he would have made the change even if Robinson had been available that night.
And he’s sticking with it: a lineup of Brunson, McBride, Mikal Bridges, Hart and Karl-Anthony Towns.
“We will continue to stay with it to see what direction it goes,” Brown said, adding later: “I’m a guy who wants to take a look at different things. And I even said this to our staff. If at times it’s the right matchup, I’m not afraid to throw a rookie out there to start. It’s all about being early in the season and trying to find the right feel for the team. … Sometimes maybe switch things up. Take a look at what you have in front of you. And see if it’s the right move long term. Who knows? But it’s still early in the year.”
A clear purpose of the lineup was to keep Towns at center, rather than power forward, as evidenced by Brown’s substitutions.
When Towns was in during the first half, Robinson was out.
And vice versa.
The strategy worked in Brooklyn, where Towns, playing center, dominated the Nets.
In Charlotte, Towns didn’t light up the boxscore — he finished with 19 points and 10 rebounds in 31 minutes — but the first half was encouraging.
He fought for better position to receive the ball, posting up smaller defenders and scoring inside against Miles Bridges.
Brown went back to a double-big lineup in the second half with Robinson at center and Towns at power forward.
Robinson finished the night with no points and four rebounds in 15 minutes. He was mostly a nonfactor. McBride, meanwhile, finished his best game of the season with 19 points on 6-of-8 shooting in 39 minutes.
“I feel like when we have a faster lineup out there, we just get the pace going, we get stops,” McBride said. “We have guys that want to guard, get stops and then get up the floor. And then we’re just good with sharing it. When KAT’s going, we’re looking for KAT. Obviously JB, he’s dominant. And then we all just feed off that.”
The Hornets, headed toward another miserable season, got 11 points from LaMelo Ball on 4-for-14 shooting in 27 minutes. Ball continued his career trend of running counter to winning.
The victory was also part of the NBA Cup competition, assuring the Knicks control their destiny for the final group play game on Black Friday against the Bucks.
What’s happening on and off the Garden court
Sign up for Inside the Knicks by Stefan Bondy, a weekly exclusive on Sports+.
Thank you
A win means they will advance to the quarterfinals. A loss means they can only advance as a wild card.
The tournament implications weren’t lost on Brown.
He kept his starters in the game late in the blowout, running up the score for point differential purposes before emptying the bench with 2:17 remaining.
It was such a blowout that, even with point differential implications, an all-out effort until the final buzzer felt like an overkill.
The starters did their part and got to rest.
