BOSTON — Karl-Anthony Towns shared a brief memory on Tuesday morning looking back at the Knicks’ stunning upset series win over the defending champion Celtics in May.
“Being tired,” Towns said. “Really tired.”
“But it was fun to see our team through all the adversity and everything being said about us and the series to come out here and play good basketball and give ourselves a chance to win, we didn’t do it early on in every game, but we found a way at the end to come out with the win and just remember our whole team being special when we needed to be special.”
The loss left Boston devastated and uncertain about the team’s future. The Celtics went on to lose or trade much of their championship core across the following months, and the hierarchy atop the east transformed. When Boston returned to Madison Square Garden earlier this season, where they lost Game 6 119-81, they suffered the franchise’s worst defeat ever in a 42-14 second quarter. The Knicks resembled the class of the East, while the Celtics fell to 0-3 in Detroit.
New York’s players saw the victory as evidence of their perseverance, but the Pacers dulled that triumph by stunning them in a Game 1 classic before winning the Eastern Conference Finals in six games. The Knicks decided to part ways with Tom Thibodeau and make minor roster tweaks, trying to build on what they achieved in the second round with a fresh coaching perspective from Mike Brown. They won four games in a row entering Boston on Tuesday after a 9-6 start, and trail an ascending Detroit team. So they’ve hardly separated themselves as the East’s best.
“Through a new system, a new coach,” Mikal Bridges said. “I know fans and stuff, and I’m not saying all, because I know a lot understand what a new system, a new coach does for players and how difficult it can be to try and learn, especially off past success, it’s different. It’s gonna take some time. I think we’re learning, not paying attention to what others think and knowing that being here every single day … it’s gonna take growth.”
That process began with overcoming what looked like an insurmountable matchup with the Celtics last year, who swept them in the season series with three double-digit wins to begin the year before escaping New York in overtime in the finale. Boston built a 16-point halftime edge in Game 1, but Kristaps Porziņģis didn’t return for the second half, the beginning of a battle with the POTS condition that carried into this season in Atlanta.
New York came back and stole the opener on a last-second steal by Bridges in overtime that he repeated to cap a 20-point second half turnaround in Game 2. He scored all 14 of his points in the fourth quarter, ingratiating himself to Knicks fans after an uneven start to his tenure with the team.
“Good memories and bad memories,” Bridges said looking back. “When they kicked our ass the first game of the season, and then obviously winning, but whole new year.”
For the Celtics, who bounced back in Game 3, the fallout continued into a double-digit Game 4 collapse where Jayson Tatum tore his Achilles. That further altered the 2025-26 season, which Tatum will miss most if not all of, and Al Horford reportedly departed the Celtics in part due to the injury. Boston shed most of their luxury tax commitment and dodged the second apron, setting up a reset season where they’ve floated around .500.
Bridges and others around the league haven’t counted out the Celtics yet, though. He credited Joe Mazzulla for instilling a mental toughness in the team, who reached within single-digits late after trailing by 24 points in New York. They’ve won 11-of-18 since, and only sit 2.5 games behind the Knicks in a loaded east. With Indiana, Boston and others hurting or resetting through the first quarter of the season, New York earned a golden opportunity to reach the Finals for the first time since 1999. And the Celtics continue to grapple with the chance they lost in the spring to become a dynasty.
“That wasn’t our strategy. We didn’t big brain that game,” Towns joked about the comebacks. “Game 1 showed all the improvements we’ve made not only as players, physical talents, but also mentally. I felt last year, we were such a mentally tough team that nothing bothered us or wavered us and a 20-point deficit against the champs and being in their home, that didn’t matter to us. We keep fighting … until the horn goes off and we just kept fighting and kept fighting, and we found ourselves with the horn going off with the win and Mikal got an amazing steal. Didn’t expect Game 2 to be deja vu, but it was. It just shows again, if you doubted us Game 1, we showed what we can do in Game 2 in the same situation … it just shows the mental fortitude of last year’s team.”
