Knicks Waste Karl-Anthony Towns History in NBA Cup Loss

An early heater from Karl-Anthony Towns couldn’t push the New York Knicks to Las Vegas.

Towns posted one of most unique first half box scores in NBA history during Wednesday’s game against the Atlanta Hawks: the newly-minted Knick had 14 rebounds, 10 points, four assists, and three blocks and steals each en route to forming a 54-47 halftime time lead. Towns is the first player to form such a statistical combination, at least in the archives of quarter/half stats compiled by Stathead, beginning with the 1996-97 season.

Alas for Towns, his potential masterpiece was far from a Knicks classic, as the team’s dreams of in-season glory ended with a 108-100 loss in the quarterfinal of the NBA Cup’s knockout proceedings. New York (15-10) thus falls in the competition’s opening stanza for the second time in as many editions.

True to form, Towns was in no mood to talk about history in the wake of a failure to obtain the most important number of all, that in the win column on the standings.

“It don’t matter,” Towns repeated in video from SNY. “If you don’t get one in the left column, it don’t mean anything … tough loss.”

Towns ended the night with a serendipitous double-double, posting 19 points and rebounds each. New York Basketball on X noted that Towns did generate back-to-back games with at least 15 points/rebounds, five assists, and two blocks/steals, becoming just the seventh player in NBA history to do so. That brotherhood also includes Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Giannis Antetokounmpo, and Charles Barkley.

With most of his work done in the first half, however, Towns could mostly only watch while Atlanta (14-12) ate away at a New York lead that reached as high as 12. Foul trouble reduced him to a spectator at crucial points and the Hawks took advantage to the tune of a plus-11 margin on the glass. New York also let up 22 offensive rebounds, its worst allowed in a game at the Garden since March 2011.

Towns’ chance for atonement lands on Sunday evening, which will host a de facto NBA Cup consolation game for the East between the Knicks and Orlando Magic (6 p.m. ET, MSG).

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