Pacers End Knicks Season in Record Breaking Fashion

Despite withstanding several medical calamities, the New York Knicks’ championship chances officially wilted at Madison Square Garden on Sunday afternoon.

The Knicks’ season is officially over, as the Indiana Pacers took advantage of their shorthanded nature and a sterling shooting performance from Tyrese Haliburton to earn a 130-109 victory in Game 7 of the Eastern Conference Semifinals. Wasted in the Knicks’ final effort was a 39-point showing from Donte DiVincenzo, who sank nine threes to set a new individual NBA record for a Game 7.

Indiana, however, was more than able to match and surpass such a landmark: It took a literally historic effort … and more metropolitan medical calamities … to end the Knicks’ season: Indiana shot 67.1 percent from the field as a team, the best success rate in a single playoff game in NBA history. That broke a 34-year-old record set by the Boston Celtics … who did so against the Knicks in 1990’s opening round.

Haliburton led the way with 26 points, hitting 10-of-16 from the floor. He was one of three Pacers to hit 20, joined by fellow starters Andrew Nembhard and Pascal Siakam (20 each).

Thus ends the Knicks’ 2023-24 campaign though their Eastern Conference Finals drought remains very much alive: New York has not been back to the national semifinal since 2000 (ironically a loss to the Pacers), extending the third-longest active drought in the NBA. Indiana, on the other hand, returns to the final four for the first time since 2014.

The Knicks’ finale was appropriately … if not macabrely … bookened by further injury woes.

New York appeared ready for a Game 7 boost when the team announced that OG Anunoby and Josh Hart would be able to partake in the contest. The former immediately energized an amplified MSG crowd with five quick points but was clearly laboring in his first game back after taking off the prior four due to hamstring issues. Anunoby lasted only five minutes before he was replaced by Miles McBride and did not return.

The Pacers led by six when Anunoby exited and it only got worse from there: after the Knicks narrowed the gap to three, Haliburton scored 11 consecutive points to create a double-figure lead that proved durable enough to survive through the halftime break.

Down 70-55 at the half and unable to contain Indiana’s scorching shooting (though Alec Burks did what he could in relief to keep the score as manageable as it was), the Knicks inched back into the contest with a 7-0 run over the first 2:27 of the second half. New York got as close as six an effort that resurrected a dormant MSG faithful but the Pacers officially sped away from the Knicks by inflating their lead back to 19, silencing the arena for good and allowing Knicks fans to officially start thinking about next season.

Jalen Brunson, having already missed major time with a foot injury in Game 2, missed the somber fourth period, as he was forced to the locker room in the third. The Knicks announced that he fractured his hand, an injury likely sustained on a third period sequence where he tried to stop a Haliburton fastbreak following a turnover.

In addition to DiVincenzo’s lost heroics, Burks capped off an otherwise trying season with 26 points on 8-of-13 shooting.

Indiana’s reward is a best-of-seven set with the top-seeded Boston Celtics. Game 1 of the series is set for Tuesday night at TD Garden (8 p.m. ET, ESPN).

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