Mike Brown says the 0-2 Knicks ‘didn’t handle’ Boston’s physicality, and tells Mikal Bridges to keep shooting

New York Knicks coach Mike Brown has a one-word explanation for his defending champions’ 0-2 start: physicality. After Friday’s 107-103 loss to the Boston Celtics at TD Garden, Brown kept coming back to the same theme, saying the Knicks lost because they “didn’t handle their physicality on both ends of the floor” for long stretches. Chris Mason of MassLive counted 16 uses of the words physical and physicality in an eight-minute press conference.

That is a pointed message for a team that won the title in June and has now dropped both of its first two games, after a 106-100 opening-night loss to the Philadelphia 76ers on Tuesday.

Where the numbers back Brown up

The box score from Boston does not show a team that was outworked on the glass. New York won the rebounding battle 44-37, took 12 offensive boards to Boston’s 10 and matched the Celtics from three, 16 makes to 15. The damage came elsewhere. The Knicks turned the ball over 16 times to Boston’s 10, a sign of what Brown described as Boston’s physical defense knocking his team off its drives, pick-and-rolls and trips into the paint. On the other end, he credited the Celtics’ screening for freeing their shooters and drivers.

The result was a game New York chased almost all night. Boston led for 36 minutes and 22 seconds, against nine minutes and two seconds for the Knicks, and pulled away with a 33-24 third quarter. Jayson Tatum scored 36 on 14-of-26 shooting, but Brown said the Celtics star was not what decided the game.

New York’s scoring was spread out. Karl-Anthony Towns had 22 points and 10 rebounds, OG Anunoby added 20 points, 10 rebounds and eight assists, and Miles McBride came off the bench to hit 6 of 8 threes for 20 points in 30 minutes. Jalen Brunson scored 19 but needed 17 shots.

Brown’s message to Mikal Bridges

The other topic in the room was Mikal Bridges, who went scoreless in Boston on 0-of-8 shooting, 0-of-5 from three, in just under 22 minutes and finished minus-12. Through two games he is 2-of-16 from the field and 0-of-7 from deep, with four total points. Brown’s answer was simple: Bridges is getting open looks, and “he’s got to keep shooting them,” SNY reported. The coach also asked Bridges to bring more physicality on the defensive end, tying his struggling wing back to the same theme he hammered all night.

The Knicks are not short on options in that rotation. Landry Shamet played 21 minutes on Friday and was plus-7, while McBride’s hot hand gives Brown another option on the wing if the shots keep missing.

What comes next

New York plays its second home game on Sunday, October 25, against the Orlando Magic at Madison Square Garden at 7:00 p.m. ET, looking for its first win of the season. Orlando will be without Paolo Banchero, who has a low-grade high ankle sprain. Lineups and live numbers are in the Magic vs. Knicks Game Center.