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By mid-August, Josh Hart was already tired of the perpetual congratulations. In September, it felt like “a burden.”
As great as winning a championship was for the Knicks — and many of the players celebrated wildly and extensively, to be clear — Hart wanted to focus on progress, not history.
“You’re fully into the swing of working out in the summer and it’s tough to turn the page,” Hart said. “Because you’re sitting there, you turn the page, you’re like ‘I got to work and then somebody says, ‘Congrats, we did this, my family did this, we watched it together,’ and you just keep getting brought back to the championship.
“You move on, you get brought back. That’s also why I can’t wait for that opening night tip, to really put all that stuff behind us.”
Hart’s conundrum is at the center of Tuesday’s season opener against the 76ers, a night at MSG meant to celebrate the feelings and accomplishments he’s been trying to avoid. It will be a test of focus from the Knicks, who will go from accepting rings to raising a banner to trying to beat LeBron James.
All within minutes.
It probably helps that New York’s head coach, Mike Brown, has participated in four ring nights with the Spurs and Warriors. There’s a voice of experience in a high position.
“It is a little tough even for me as a coach,” Brown said. “People are patting you on the back, telling how good you are and it’s good and you want people to be able to do that with you and for you and all that stuff, but in the same breath there always has to be a part of you — and I know this from experience that says — don’t listen to this, don’t read this, don’t watch this. Because it’s hard to stay even-keeled in situations like that. You got to embrace it, you got to enjoy it with others, especially your family, but try to come back down to earth as soon as possible. … We have a pretty sharp group. But if they don’t know, we’ll definitely help by reminding them, ‘This is not last year. This is a new season and we can’t just think we’re going to switch that light on and get after it.’ ”
History suggests the Knicks will beat the Sixers. The defending champions are 64-15 in their home openers, according to The Elias Sports Bureau, which isn’t surprising because defending champs tend to be good. Not all of those games were ‘ring night,’ but most were and the recent examples hold firm:
The last loser of their own ring night was the 2020 Lakers, who fell to the Clippers in an empty arena because of the pandemic. James, who will be at ring night Tuesday with the 76ers, was on those Lakers. Two years ago, the Knicks were shellacked by the Celtics on ring night in Boston.
OG Anunoby won his ring night with the Raptors in 2019, but it required overtime to topple the Pelicans. Anunoby finished with 11 points, seven rebounds and two blocks in 36 minutes.
“You celebrate with the ring, take pictures, then the game started. It was kind of weird,” Anunoby said. “Then the game goes on, first quarter and second quarter, it gets back to normal. You get used to it. But initially, yeah, it was kind of weird.”
For Hart, Jalen Brunson and Mikal Bridges, this will be their first game as champs on ring night. They were the defending NCAA titlists with Villanova in 2016, but the banner was raised at a students-only pep rally called Hoops Mania — not before a game.
Brunson, nonetheless, understands the assignment.
“It’s about how quickly you turn a page and how quickly you understand that the egos have to be checked at the door,” he said.