Karl-Anthony Towns took the bruise from his left knee, and together with his New York Knicks teammates, planted it squarely on the Indiana Pacers’ foreheads, keeping the Eastern Conference finals alive for at least another game.
Towns shook off a sore knee and “questionable” designation on the injury report to go for 24 points and 13 rebounds, Jalen Brunson turned in another monster game with 32 points and New York beat Indiana 111-94 Thursday at Madison Square Garden.
The Pacers still lead the series, 3-2, with Game 6 at 8 p.m. ET Saturday in Indianapolis. Indiana’s stars struggled mightily in Game 5, with Tyrese Haliburton, the series MVP up until this point, managing just eight points on 2-of-7 shooting. A bench player, Bennedict Mathurin, was Indiana’s leading scorer with 23 points.
The Knicks are trying to become the first team in history to lose the first two games of the conference finals at home and go on to win the series.
“You just take it game-by-game, you’ve got to keep fighting every game, every possession,” Knicks coach Tom Thibodeau said.
The Pacers had won six consecutive road playoff games prior to Game 5. They can still close out this series and punch their first trip to the NBA Finals since 2000, and second in franchise history, by winning Game 6.
“It’s never not the hardest game,” Pacers coach Rick Carlisle said about closeout games. His team closed out Milwaukee in the first round and Cleveland in the second with Game 5 triumphs.
Pascal Siakam was the only Indiana starter to score in double-figures, finishing with 15 points on 5-of-13 shooting. The Pacers also lost reserve center Tony Bradley to a left hip strain.
Towns, an All-NBA selection, was averaging 25.8 points and 11.4 rebounds and is shooting 45 percent from 3-point range in this series prior to Game 5, but has been targeted defensively because he struggles to guard in space, where the Pacers thrive.
Indiana managed to ring up five fouls against Towns, but he played with much more force than his counterparts. He shot 10 of 20 from the field and added three assists. His baseline drive through Mathurin for a basket (he missed the free throw) with 2:44 left put the Knicks back up by 16, and the game was about over.
This was, by far, the most lopsided game in what had been a very close series. Though Indiana won three out of the first four, the Pacers’ total margin in the conference finals was plus-11 heading into Game 5. Which means, of course, after losing by 17 Thursday, they have now been outscored in the series.
