The New York Knicks ended their 2023-24 season with a disappointing 130-108 Game 7 loss to the Indiana Pacers. The Knicks were heavily battered by the end of this run, with five of their starters from this season being out with injuries and one key bench player.
Jalen Brunson (fractured hand)
OG Anunoby (hamstring strain)
Josh Hart (abdominal strain)
Julius Randle (dislocated shoulder)
Mitchell Robinson (ankle stress injury)
Bojan Bogdanović (foot surgery)
Brunson suffered his fractured hand in their Game 7 loss, putting up 17 points in 29 minutes. Hart played through his abdominal strain in Game 7 before fouling out with 10 points, eight rebounds, and five assists. Anunoby tried to make a go at playing but was removed from the game five minutes in as he didn’t look healthy.
Bogdanovic was a casualty of the first-round series against the 76ers, suffering a foot injury that required surgery during Game 4. Mitchell Robinson spent most of the season out with an ankle injury, which was reinjured after a dirty play by Joel Embiid during Game 2 of the series, a play which remains controversial.
Julius Randle suffered his shoulder injury in January and hasn’t returned, electing to have surgery towards the end of the regular season and foregoing a possible return to fully heal.
All of these players suffered ticky-tack injuries throughout the season, with Anunoby playing only 23 games of the regular season with New York and players like Brunson missing time as well. Hart’s injury was a result of wear and tear, with the Knicks forward playing multiple positions across entire games before his body was worn out.
Tom Thibodeau Needs To Alter His Rotation Style
Many people will blame Knicks head coach Tom Thibodeau for the fragility of his roster. Coach Thibs’ played his players to the point of exhaustion this season, a pattern that started towards the end of the regular season. While that was born out of necessity, with the Knicks suffering injuries all season long, the players clearly started declining as a result of fatigue.
Jalen Brunson averaged 35.5 points, 4.5 rebounds, and 9.0 assists in the first round, which fell to 29.7 points, 2.3 rebounds, and 6.1 assists in the second round. He was excellent for most of the Playoffs, but he was heavily limited until his hand fracture in Game 7 anyway. He averaged 39.8 minutes played per game. Coach Thibs wants to maximize winning, so it doesn’t seem like he’ll be willing to change his ways now after some of the instances in his past.
The last time a player played similar minutes to Josh Hart in the Playoffs was Jimmy Butler, also under coach Thibodeau. Butler has suffered various minor injuries in recent seasons which could be a result of the heavy workload he had for most of his career. Coach Thibs doesn’t trust more than 8 players on his team and if they get hurt, he tries to get the other seven to replace the production.
Hart averaged 42.2 minutes per game during the Playoffs.
The best way for the Knicks to avoid this problem next season is by adding a deeper bench of playable depth, but there’s no guarantee that Thibs would play them either. He wants to maximize his pieces, not sacrifice them to have a robust rotation.
The Knicks can’t have another promising season end in such fashion, as a healthy Knicks likely would’ve been the clear No. 2 in the East, given they suffered various injuries and still made it to that position.
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