Knicks Get Impressive Win On Leon Rose's First Day As President

The Knicks cooled down the red-hot Rockets with a 125-123 win

NEW YORK — So, remember a few hours ago, pregame, when I wrote I was sure Leon Rose would love the Knicks to get a win on his first day as president? 

Well, guess what: the Knicks did it! They got the win vs the extremely talented Rockets, helping the Leon Rose era get off to a good start in New York. “He’s undefeated, he’s 1-0,” Julius Randle joked postgame.

This is an impressive win for the Knicks, maybe their most impressive of the year. Coming into this game Houston was on a six-game win street and Russell Westbrook was playing some of the best basketball of his season. It’s no secret that Houston can put the ball in the basket, and often, but New York was able to keep up with them offensively tonight. For the Knicks to win this game their offense needed to be clicking, they could not be leaving points on the floor and they didn’t.

New York came out of the locker room hot, they put up 36 points in the first quarter, in large part due to a strong performance from RJ Barrett who had one of the best, if not the best games of his career. They then put up 37 points in the second quarter and went into halftime with a 73-63 lead. It needs to be mentioned that Wayne Ellington hit five 3’s tonight, it seems like any game he can go off from beyond the arc. The scoring slowed down a bit from New York in the third quarter and the fourth quarter is when Houston started to come to life. Just when it seemed Russell Westbrook was going to take over this game late in the fourth, the young backcourt of RJ Barrett and Frank Ntilikina stepped up. Ntilikina had some impressive defensive plays while RJ Barrett hit a clutch shot with 7 seconds left to give the Knicks a three-point lead. “Score,” RJ Barrett responded when asked what his mindset was on that big-time shot.

James Harden had high praise for the rookie when asked about his performance “Aggressive. I like it, especially as a rookie. Not timid at all and when you’re aggressive and confident in your game, you look good out there.”

After the final buzzer sounded Mike Miller looked ecstatic up on the sideline, it seemed like he was giving one of those pumped up hugs to his assistant coach. You could tell postgame that Miller was proud of his team, he told reporters, “The resiliency just to stay in there. We knew they were going to make a run. We knew that no matter what happens with the firepower and how quick they can get back in it we knew that they could get back in the game.” He continued, “There were so many guys that played well. That’s the strength of our team. I think these guys are really embracing that, that we have to do it together and that everybody has to do their ho and value all of those jobs.”

Leon Rose’s first day as president probably went as great as possible. Hopefully, it’s a sign of days ahead for the Knicks of this new era.