Knicks' bench provides spark in win over Bucks
Knicks guard Miles McBride looks for shooting space defended by Milwaukee Bucks guard AJ Green in the second half of an NBA basketball game at Madison Square Garden on Sunday, Jan. 12, 2025. Credit: Kathleen Malone-Van Dyke
The Knicks, who desperately needed some quality minutes from their bench, got plenty of them in Sunday’s 140-106 victory over Milwaukee at the Garden.
Before the game became a blowout in the third quarter, coach Tom Thibodeau used three reserves: Precious Achiuwa, Deuce McBride and Cameron Payne. Five more backups got in during garbage time in the fourth, but it was the efforts of the first three men off the bench that helped spark the Knicks.
Payne scored 18 points, one shy of his Knicks high, in 14:22. Achiuwa had four points in 14:54 filling in for OG Anunoby and Karl-Anthony Towns after they got into early foul trouble. McBride scored six points in 19:40.
Of Payne’s contributions, Thibodeau said: “Huge. Huge. Huge. And those were big minutes, especially the way they unfolded. I think KAT, the early foul trouble, too, I thought Precious gave us good minutes. So that bench play was really good and we needed that.”
The Knicks’ bench play has not been good of late, which leads to ever-present concerns that Thibodeau is using his starters for too many minutes with half a season and the postseason to go.
“Has Thibs ever played his bench?” Bucks coach Doc Rivers said before Sunday’s game. “I’m joking. I’m joking. It’s tough, though. It really is.”
It’s all about trust, Rivers said. He told a story about former NBA player Lou Williams, who once scored 15 points in the fourth quarter to lead the Clippers to a win over the Knicks after a night out partying in New York in 2019. (Williams, who is retired, has told the story on his podcast.)
“The funniest story ever, and I had honestly forgotten the story,” Rivers said. “But Lou Williams told that story recently about a game here. He said it, so I’m not giving you guys new information here, but he went out that night [before] and we had an afternoon game, and I put him in and he wanted to come out because he said, ‘Coach, I’m not drunk, but I’m hung over.’
“He had that big fourth quarter here, and we won. The truth be told, as I looked down [the bench], I’m thinking, ‘Lou is our best option.’ And that happens at times and it’s tough. You’ve got to trust [your reserves] and then we find out a lot of times you just can’t. When that happens, it does limit you. It limits your choices. You have to play guys bigger minutes.
“I don’t know that, but if that’s what [the Knicks are] doing, they’re doing it for a reason. You know one thing, we coaches, we see everybody every day in practice. We know exactly how guys are playing and who you can trust, for the most part.”
Anthony Rieber covers baseball, as well as the NFL, NBA and NHL. He has worked at Newsday since Aug. 31, 1998, and has been in his current position since July 5, 2004.
