New York Knicks All-Star Jalen Brunson is not looking for any excuse to masquerade the team’s recent slump, magnified by their 110-99 loss to the Golden State Warriors last Friday.
Brunson put himself and his Knicks teammates on the hot seat after the game. The 27-year-old had this to say to the media, per ESPN’s Tim Bontemps:
“We clearly need to be better,” Brunson declared. “We can definitely learn from our past. We can be upset, (ticked) off for the rest of today, until we fall asleep. But tomorrow morning, we’ve got to be focused on the next one. Keep our spirits up, keep our confidence up. We all need to work hard individually to be confident.”
Injuries and poor play have led to the Knicks’ 2-7 cold stretch
The Knicks are dealing with a crushing amount of injuries. They’re also working Bojan Bogdanovic and Alec Burks into the fold. However, Brunson’s rigid approach is warranted. The Knicks have dropped seven of their last nine games. New York has shot 43.4% from the field in that stretch. They don’t have a single non-center shooting better than 45% from the floor.
Individually, Bogdanovic has not stepped up with Julius Randle, OG Anunoby, and Isaiah Hartenstein all banged up. The Serbian forward is down to 13.3 points per game in seven appearances off the bench, a marked regression from his 20.2 points with the Pistons.
Jalen Brunson is bent on improving day by day amid Knicks’ recent woes
The Knicks are getting double-double production from Previous Achiuwa and 20.1 points per game from DiVincenzo, but as a unit, they’re coughing up 113.1 points to opponents and losing by an average margin of 8.9 points per game.
With or without their full lineup intact, the Knicks have to be better. Their team leader stressing so is a step in the right direction.