MINNEAPOLIS — Karl-Anthony Cities thanked God. For as soon as, the highlight wasn’t on him.
Sure, it was Cities’ long-awaited homecoming — a return to Minnesota’s Goal Heart after the blockbuster commerce that despatched him to New York in alternate for Julius Randle and Donte DiVincenzo.
And sure, Cities was the star of the present, receiving a standing ovation, two video tributes, and delivering a dominant 32-point, 20-rebound efficiency within the emphatic victory, turning into the primary Knick to submit a 30-20 sport since Enes Kanter Freedom on Christmas Day 2017.
But on this second, the main focus turned to Mikal Bridges, and Cities eagerly shifted the highlight.
In any case, that is the participant the Knicks envisioned once they surrendered 5 first-round picks in a daring offseason cope with the Nets.
The participant the Knicks banked on has lastly cashed in.
Bridges scored 29 factors on an environment friendly 12-of-18 capturing from the sphere and 4-of-8 from past the arc, including six rebounds and 6 assists within the Knicks’ 133-107 victory over the Wolves on Thursday.
On the defensive finish, he hounded Timberwolves star Anthony Edwards into an uncharacteristic 17-point efficiency — 9 beneath Edwards’ career-best season common.
It’s the sort of sport that felt inevitable to Bridges’ teammates, even when the early-season struggles made the street right here appear longer.
Now, Bridges is displaying the world the star his teammates at all times knew he was.
“Us as teammates, we had to help him, and we had to be better for him,” Cities stated after the sport from his locker. “I think all of us understood the challenge and accepted the challenge and made it an emphasis to get him going. He’s not just a player in this league. He’s a star in this league, and he deserves to have the thought process of a star.
“We had to do better for him. And it was us — it was not him. He’s been nothing but a pro, and we found ways to get him the ball in spots that he succeeds at.”
* * *
Outdoors noise can kill a profession from the within. Mikal Bridges wears noise-canceling headphones.
However his imaginative and prescient? Completely intact. And even with the quantity down, the whispers of vital Knicks followers had been not possible to disregard.
Bridges blocked out the noise, tuning out the relentless social media scrutiny after a disastrous begin to the season.
Even he can admit the numbers weren’t fairly.
Bridges shot an abysmal 2-of-19 from past the arc in the course of the preseason. The struggles bled into the common season, the place he missed 86 of his first 124 three-point makes an attempt.
On a Knicks crew with championship aspirations — and one closely invested in his manufacturing — the burden of these misses was immense. The criticism was lighter fluid on an already roaring fireplace.
And the strain of enjoying beneath the brilliant lights of Madison Sq. Backyard has damaged loads of gamers earlier than.
Not Bridges. Not right this moment. And, in response to Cameron Payne, not ever.
Payne, Bridges’ shut pal since their time as teammates in Phoenix in 2019, by no means doubted his resilience.
“I’ve known Mikal for [a long time], so I knew [the outside noise] didn’t affect him just by the guy I know him as,” Payne stated after Thursday’s victory. “I knew once he started making shots, now ain’t nobody saying nothing. Like ain’t nobody talking about how [his form] looks now.
“He’s pretty good with stuff like that. I applaud him for it, ’cause he could easily get distracted and messed up in the head.”
The feedback weren’t fully escapable. In right this moment’s media panorama, scrutiny finds the participant, not the opposite approach round.
Bridges didn’t permit the destructive discuss to take root.
“[I] just stayed locked in,” he stated. “They’re not there every day with me in the gym working and understanding. Nothing much I could listen to because they’re not there with me. So just taking it day by day and just knowing it’s a process and something I had to get used to — getting traded in the summer versus halfway through the season when you already have a rhythm.”
His teammates performed a significant position in maintaining him centered.
OG Anunoby pointed to “constant encouragement” and Bridges’ relentless work ethic as key to his turnaround.
Bridges agreed.
“For sure. That’s what always keeps me sane with all the noise on the outside: my teammates and people I care about the most [that I’m] around every single day,” he stated. “They’ve got that faith in me, and that’s always gonna keep my head leveled.”
* * *
Typically, all it takes is one sport to flip the script. For Bridges, that sport got here towards a decimated New Orleans Pelicans crew lacking nearly each one among its recognizable names.
Bridges erupted for 31 factors on 12-of-17 capturing from the sphere and 7-of-12 from deep in a Dec. 1 blowout at MSG. Since that evening, Bridges has tallied a team-high 177 factors. He’s capturing an environment friendly 58% from the sphere and has made 25 of his final 58 3s, good for a 43% clip from downtown.
The Knicks have additionally outscored opponents by 129 factors within the 310.7 minutes Bridges has performed during the last eight video games. One other team-high for the reason that New Orleans sport.
Bridges is now averaging 22.1 factors per sport within the month of December, a dramatic enchancment from the 15.5 factors he averaged by the primary 19 video games of the season.
“The highs and lows of a season, you can’t really worry about what’s going on on the outside or what people say or anything like that,” Jalen Brunson stated. “It’s a credit to his focus and his preparation and everything. It took one game for him to click, and we don’t see him turning back.”
All through Bridges’ prolonged capturing hunch, head coach Tom Thibodeau remained unfazed. A agency believer within the numbers, Thibodeau trusted the information, which overwhelmingly pointed to a turnaround for his star.
Bridges, in spite of everything, is a profession 37.5% three-point shooter who hasn’t dipped beneath 36% from past the arc since his rookie season.
“We felt like [a turnaround] would happen, just based on his career. You know who he is as a player,” Thibodeau stated Thursday morning. “Sometimes things don’t happen overnight, but his body of work tells you basically what he’s going to do, and as time has gone on, each game, he’s gotten more and more comfortable, and he does a little bit of everything. He’s key for our team.”
* * *
However what precisely modified? Bridges’ capturing kind hasn’t wavered, so the place are the jokes now?
Payne agreed, including that Bridges’ elevated aggression extends past the offensive facet of the ball.
“I feel like our defense is leading to offense, and I feel like he’s kinda been at the head of the snake with that,” he stated. “Once he gets going, I think that he’s pretty solid from there on out. He’s starting to find his stride. He’s been playing well.”
Thibodeau attributed Bridges’ current surge to rising familiarity together with his teammates and a deeper understanding of the system.
“He’s so steady. … He’s got a great rhythm going right now,” he stated after the sport. “He’s playing a great floor game. He’s moving without the ball. He’s getting down the floor quickly in transition, and I think finding those shots, that’s when he’s hard to guard: when he’s moving like that.”
In reality, Bridges is realizing a brand new model of himself. The model the Knicks want him to be in the event that they’re going to be the final crew standing on the finish of the season.
In Phoenix, Bridges excelled as a task participant on offense whereas guarding the opposing crew’s finest participant on protection. In Brooklyn, he grew to become the Nets’ No. 1 scoring possibility, averaging 26.9 factors per sport within the second half of the 2022-23 season after the crew dismantled its championship core by buying and selling Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving.
This, nevertheless, isn’t Phoenix or Brooklyn Bridges.
That is Manhattan Bridges — a mix of his previous roles and experiences, crafted into the participant the Knicks are relying on to assist elevate the franchise to heights it hasn’t reached since 1973.
“I try to be a mix [of Phoenix and Brooklyn],” Bridges stated. “That’s the biggest thing. I think that’s a big reason why I got traded here is to be able to do both. I’m just trying to get better every day and do well on both ends.”
“At the beginning of the year, he had that Brooklyn ‘Kal, but I kinda feel like he getting back to that Phoenix ‘Kal,” Payne added. “But honestly, he’s been different ever since he left Phoenix, in a good way. I feel like his offensive game is starting to come around and be more complete. I think Brooklyn helped him with that. Honestly, I just think he’s starting to figure it out.”
Bridges should still be figuring issues out, however his progress is plain. And so are the Knicks — if that is the model of the participant they’ll depend on because the season heats up.
