The New York Knicks beat the Cleveland Cavaliers 121-108 at Rocket Arena on Saturday to take a 3-0 lead in the Eastern Conference Final. They can close the series out in Game 4 on Monday and book the franchise's first NBA Finals appearance since 1999.
What happened
Jalen Brunson finished with 30 points on 10-of-19 shooting, 6 assists, and a 10-of-12 night at the line in 41 minutes. He went 0-for-4 from three but got into the paint at will against Donovan Mitchell and Darius Garland. Karl-Anthony Towns added 13 points, 8 rebounds, and 7 assists. Cleveland tied the game at 48-48 in the second quarter; the Knicks pulled away from there and never trailed again on the way to a 13-point margin.
Mitchell led Cleveland with 23 points but turned the ball over five times. Max Strus hit four threes for 13 points. The Cavaliers, who entered the playoffs as the East's No. 1 seed, never found a defensive answer for Brunson's two-man game with Towns.
The streak
That's ten straight playoff wins for New York, with a franchise-record average margin of 22.5 points. The context is the impressive part: they came back from 2-0 down to beat Detroit in the conference semis, then ran off six in a row against Cleveland.
What's at stake
Game 4 is Monday at 8 p.m. ET in Cleveland on ESPN. A win sends the Knicks to the Finals to face the winner of the Thunder–Spurs Western Conference Final, where Oklahoma City leads 2-1. A loss reopens a series Cleveland still has to play four straight to win. No team in NBA history has come back from 3-0; 156 teams have tried.
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