Jalen Brunson scored 33 factors and sealed the sport with huge buckets late to the delight of roaring Knicks followers, main New York to a 109-94 win over the Philadelphia 76ers on Friday evening for a 3-0 lead within the Japanese Convention semifinals.
Recreation 4 is Sunday in Philadelphia.
Brunson shook off a two-of-eight begin from the ground and completed 11 of twenty-two in 38 minutes to ship the Knicks to their sixth straight post-season victory.
“I’m Linus. Jalen’s my blanket,” first-year Knicks coach Mike Brown mentioned. “He helps me loosen up at a number of totally different instances throughout the course of the sport.”
With 2016 and 2018 Villanova nationwide championship banners hanging within the rafters, the so-called Nova Knicks all took turns taking the battle out of the Sixers within the fourth quarter, turning a four-point lead into one other double-digit victory.
Josh Hart had 12 factors and 11 rebounds and Mikal Bridges added 23 factors, pushing the Knicks inside one victory of their second straight convention finals look.
When Brown took the job after Tom Thibodeau was fired, the veteran coach mentioned he wouldn’t know what sort of group he actually had till he received “into the trenches with them.”
Brown now sees the makings of a championship group.
“Yeah, OK, we would have an opportunity at this,” he mentioned.
The Knicks have the posh to not rush again ahead OG Anunoby, who’s averaging 21.4 factors per recreation within the postseason. He sat out with a strained proper hamstring and stays daily.
Joel Embiid scored 18 factors for the Sixers in his return after he missed Recreation 2 with a sprained proper ankle and a sore proper hip.
“I believed he gave us all the things he might,” coach Nick Nurse mentioned.
Embiid’s return from an appendectomy helped spur the Sixers’ rally from a 3-1 deficit within the opening spherical to stun the Celtics.
Beating the Knicks 4 straight instances — together with twice in New York — looks as if a a lot tougher hill to climb for Embiid, Tyrese Maxey and the Sixers.
Kelly Oubre Jr. scored 22 factors and Maxey added 17. Paul George scored 15 factors within the first quarter, then went scoreless and missed all 9 photographs the remainder of the sport because the Sixers blew a 12-point lead.
George and Maxey every didn’t shoot a single free throw.
The 76ers gamely tried to make it a sequence. Quintin Grimes hit his first two 3s of the sport early within the fourth to trim the result in 88-84.
The acquainted faces in Philly — Brunson, Hart and Bridges all performed for Villanova — seized management of the sport.
Hart and Bridges made consecutive baskets that pushed the result in 92-84. Brunson, the stone-cold shooter constructed for these moments, buried a 3 from the highest of the arc that made it 95-86 throughout a 9-0 Knicks run, to the delight of the visiting followers.
Embiid overtly pleaded with followers forward of the sequence to not promote their tickets to New Yorkers.
Celeb Row regulars at Madison Sq. Backyard, Spike Lee, Timothée Chalamet, Tracy Morgan and Ben Stiller all made the journey to Philadelphia, together with 1000’s of much less well-known Knicks followers — and the break up crowd erupted in cheers, boos and the occasional center finger on nearly each basket.
Chalamet rose from his seat and applauded when Landry Shamet buried a late 3 within the third that stretched the result in 85-76. Shamet had 14 factors this complete postseason earlier than he scored 15 in Recreation 3.
Revealed on Might 09, 2026