The New York Knicks weren’t ready to go home. Not yet.
With their season on the line, the Knicks delivered their most complete performance of the Eastern Conference Finals, routing the Indiana Pacers in Game 5 on Friday (PH time), May 30.
[ALSO READ: Resilient Knicks stave off elimination, foil Pacers to force Game 6 back in Indianapolis]
For the first time in this series, a team won by double digits — a departure from the razor-thin margins of the first four contests, all decided by nine points or fewer.
“It’s been a hard-fought series. The game is evolving real close [into] one-possession games. There’s 50-50 plays that can go either way and sometimes you don’t get them, but you have to keep fighting and not give in,” Knicks coach Tom Thibodeau told reporters in the post-game press conference.
In a must-win game, New York never trailed. And Jalen Brunson made sure of it.
Brunson set the tone early and finished with 32 points — his franchise-record 21st career 30-point playoff performance — after getting outplayed by counterpart Tyrese Haliburton.
He scored the first six points of the game to spark the Knicks to an early lead, and they never trailed in a must-win game.
JALEN BRUNSON FEELING IT EARLY 🔥
— NBA (@NBA) May 30, 2025
3 straight buckets to start East Finals Game 5 on TNT!!!
Brunson finished with 14 first-quarter points and added a crucial scoring burst in the third, helping New York build a 22-point cushion — its largest lead of the series.
“Jalen was cooking — that’s what I saw,” Karl-Anthony Towns said of his teammate’s hot start. “When he’s playing like that, hitting those shots, it energizes everyone.”
"He was cooking."@KarlTowns describes @jalenbrunson1's hot start, scoring 14 of his 32 PTS in the 1Q 🔥
— NBA (@NBA) May 30, 2025
Knicks force Game 6 on Saturday at 8pm/et on TNT! https://t.co/Uxw3vroPP5 pic.twitter.com/qxvFLSLpMw
It did — including the sweet-shooting big man himself.
Bruised knee at all, Towns put up a dominant outing of 24 points and 13 rebounds in a gutsy showing as the Knicks dominated from the start and never looked back.
“Our backs were against the wall. So, I mean, we’ve got to give it everything we got,” Brunson noted.
The Knicks, who gave up 43 points in the first quarter of Game 4, set the tone defensively from the tip, holding Indiana to 23 in the opening frame and just 45 in the first half.
Haliburton, fresh off a historic 32-point triple-double in the last game, was limited to just eight points on seven shots and six assists.
“It’s probably a combination of him missing some shots he normally makes,” Thibodeau insisted. “But I thought our guys were tied together and trying to make him work for everything, and that’s what you have to do: you have to fight to win every possession.”
“I think we paid attention to detail better as a team. The little things go a long way. They really do help,” Brunson added.
"I feel like we picked up our intensity a little bit. I think we paid attention to detail better as a team"
— Knicks Videos (@sny_knicks) May 30, 2025
Jalen Brunson talks about what the Knicks did better tonight against Tyrese Haliburton defensively:
The little things — and plenty of big ones — added up to a wire-to-wire win.
“We have no room for error. Our backs are against the wall, every game is a do-or-die. If you don’t bring that energy and execution, our season will be over,” Towns insisted.
For this particular game, it didn’t.
Game 6 shifts back to Indiana on Sunday (PH time), June 1 as the Knicks are seeking to become the 14th team in league history to come back from a 3-1 deficit, and the first to ever win a conference finals after dropping the first two games at home.
They’re not there yet.
But with momentum on their side, maybe one win turns into two — and maybe, just maybe, three.
