Knicks Last Championship: New York Wins 109-93, Reaches 2-0
The knicks last championship conversation has new fuel. New York beat the Cavaliers 109–93 on Thursday night and moved to a 2–0 lead in the Eastern Conference finals. The win also pushed the Knicks to a ninth straight postseason victory.
New York’s 109–93 edge
The margin stayed in double digits from the final score, and it kept New York perfect in the series so far. The Knicks now own 10 playoff wins in this postseason run, with nine of them coming by 10 or more points.
That kind of run is rare even by playoff standards. Thirty-three teams in NBA history have won at least nine playoff games by 10 or more points in a single postseason, and 31 of them reached the NBA Finals. Twenty-seven won the championship.
Knicks point-differential company
The larger number behind this stretch is even sharper. No team in NBA history has posted a better point differential over a nine-game stretch in the playoffs or regular season than the Knicks. New York became the sixth team in league history to post a point differential of +200 or better over a nine-game stretch.
The only other team to do that this season was the Thunder, who hit +200 over nine games in November. The low end of that scale sits with the Thunder as well: from April 2 to April 16 in 2021, they were outscored by 225 points over a nine-game stretch.
Thunder, Celtics, Finals path
Josh Dubow reported that only two teams had more than nine double-digit playoff wins entering the Finals. The 2016–17 Warriors and the 2012–13 Heat each reached 10 such wins before the Finals, and both won the title.
There is still one more series to sort out in the West, and that matters for the title picture that has started to form around New York. For now, the Knicks have done the part that gives them the strongest possible position: they have controlled the first two games, kept the streak alive, and put Cleveland in a 2–0 hole.
