San Antonio (AFP) – Jalen Brunson says doubters have only made the New York Knicks work harder to capture the club’s first title since 1973 in the NBA Finals against San Antonio. The Knicks carry an 11-game playoff win streak into Wednesday’s opening game of the best-of-seven showdown at San Antonio, with Brunson the post-season scoring leader at 26.9 points a game.
“I’m very excited to be here,” he said. “Once-in-a-lifetime opportunity you can’t take for granted.” Brunson, a 29-year-old guard from suburban New York, also has 6.6 assists and 2.8 rebounds a game.
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“We’re a focused group. We’re a hard-working group. I feel like we’ve been doubted a lot,” Brunson said Tuesday. “There has been a lot of noise on the outside that we could obviously talk about, complain about, do something about. We’ve always just went back into the gym, worked on our game individually. When it came to practice, now we’re focused. When it came to games, we kept getting better and better.”
“Our mentality is in the right place at the right time. We just got to stay focused and keep learning. Even today, we can’t be satisfied because we’re here, we have to keep learning.” That attitude has made Brunson a natural leader on a squad with enough depth and talent to spread the ball around and play tough defensively.
“The way I’ve gone about being a leader is taking bits and pieces of different things that I’ve learned from leaders and try to make them my own,” he said. “Just making sure we’re all on the same page, we’re all learning together, we’re all accountable for each other. We’re going to go through this together, ups and downs, like we have been. That’s what’s most important.”
Brunson is trying to keep the preparations like normal, though he admits the hoopla around the first game has added drama. “Everything leading up to game one is going to be definitely heightened just because of everything going on around it,” Brunson said. “Most importantly, when you prepare the right way, when you do your routines, treat it like a normal game, it allows it to be as normal as possible.”
One thing that won’t change is the pressure Brunson faces guarded by the Spurs’ defensive star Stephon Castle. “He’s great. His intensity and tenacity is special. He plays with a chip on his shoulder,” Brunson said of Castle. “He’s tough. It’s something you have to game-plan for. Just be smart.”
Castle has learned some valuable clues how to handle Brunson from prior contests. “What has worked for me is trying to be physical with him. He’s a very physical guard, gets to his spots well. Uses deception well, has great footwork,” Castle said. “Try to be as disciplined as I can, crowd his space, but not give him the angles he’s looking for. Just trying to impose my will and use my physicality to my advantage.”
– Spurs ‘very physical’ – Brunson knows the Spurs will shift schemes and personnel to try and keep him off balance. “They are very physical. The way they play they are able to pressure on the perimeter. Having Wemby down there on the weak side creates havoc,” Brunson said. “They are very multi-dimensional and have a lot of ways they can beat you on both sides of the ball. Paying attention to the details when it comes to game day is very important for us.”
Brunson’s father, Rick, was a guard for the Knicks in the 1999 NBA Finals, when New York lost to the Spurs. “It’s pretty surreal,” he said. “Once the career is over, it’ll be time to think about the stuff and be able to go through it together. It’s definitely a cool feeling.”
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