'Sticking together no matter what': Shorthanded Knicks won't let anything stand in their way

NEW YORK – Sure, the New York Knicks have injuries. Yes, they’ll be shorthanded the rest of the playoffs.

But that was a theme throughout the regular season and they finished with the No. 2 seed in the Eastern Conference.

Now?

Now Tom Thibodeau’s team has a commanding 2-0 lead in the Eastern Conference semifinals after beating the Indiana Pacers 130-121 in Game 2 Wednesday night at Madison Square Garden, another game where they relied on every ounce of grit, tenacity and toughness they could possibly muster.

Along the way they lost their leader and their star Jalen Brunson to a right foot injury that cost him the entire second quarter before heroically returning to begin the second half – he still managed to finish with 29 points in 32 minutes.

Then the Knicks lost OG Anunoby, who’s been a force on both ends of the floor since coming over from the Toronto Raptors in a midseason trade, to a left hamstring injury.

He's been ruled out for Game 3, but his status for the rest of the playoffs beyond that is unclear.

And Anunoby’s injury is coming at a time when the Knicks are already without Mitchell Robinson (left ankle) and Bojan Bogdanovic (foot and wrist) for the rest of the playoffs.

But at this point, how much will one more injury even matter?

The Knicks' 'blueprint'

We’re going to find out, but somehow, some way, the Knicks keep finding ways to win despite the odds sometimes appearing against them.

“I think there’s a blueprint here that Thibs has laid out,” said Donte DiVincenzo, who had 28 points in Game 2. “No matter who is on the court, everybody follows that and doesn’t go outside of themselves so no matter who is in the game we know we’re looking to get and any game we play as long as we defend with low turnovers, we can win any game. That was the mindset tonight.”

Anunoby was tremendous in Game 2. He had 28 points on 10-of-19 shooting, including 4-of-7 from deep, when he left the game. Aggressive going to the basket, knocking down shots from the perimeter, defending hard on the other end – Anunoby did a little bit of everything.

So make no mistake: Losing him for any period of time is going to hurt the Knicks.

In case you haven’t heard, the Knicks don’t exactly play a deep bench.

But just take a look at what the Knicks did throughout the regular season, overcoming injury after injury to key players.

"We are just sticking together no matter what, no matter what the situation is, no matter what is thrown at us, no matter what is a disadvantage for us," Brunson said. "We’re going to stick together and that’s the thing we always harp on for each other."

'This is our way'

Things didn’t look so good when Brunson left the game late in the first quarter, then missed the entire second.

When he returned to the court for the start of the third quarter to a huge roar from the crowd and chants of “MVP!,” the entire fanbase breathed a sign of relief.

Brunson’s return set a tone.

“A lot of toughness,” Thibodeau said. “I think the make-up, we know that’s his make-up but that’s also the make-up of our team.”

The Knicks still have a lot of work to do. They need two more wins to take this series. Then in all likelihood, the powerhouse Boston Celtics will be waiting in the conference finals.

Nothing has been easy about the Knicks’ path to this point. Nothing may be easy from this point forward.

But given what they’ve shown, can you count them out anytime soon?

It would be awfully hard to.

“This might be a byproduct of being shorthanded all year,” Thibodeau said. “We know this is our way. Our way is to play really hard all the time and play together. If we do that, we’ll have a chance.”

This article originally appeared on NorthJersey.com: NY Knicks injuries mounting vs. Indiana Pacers, but will it matter?