Knicks abandon key Tom Thibodeau philosophy: will it deliver more playoff success?

NEW YORK – The New Year is often celebrated as an opportunity for new beginnings. The New York Knicks did not take their chance to turn a defensive page, beginning 2026 with a 111-99 loss to the Atlanta Hawks on Friday. Despite shooting just 9-of-43 from 3-point range, New York pulled within single digits late in the fourth quarter. Head coach Mike Brown said they still lost because they did not execute on defense.

“If the shot’s not falling, where else are we going to hang our hat? It has to be on the defensive end of the floor. And we didn’t get it done throughout most of the game tonight,” Brown told reporters after the game.

After posting the league’s tenth-highest defensive rating of 112.3 in November, the Knicks closed the year with a 118.0 rating in December. That was 21st in the NBA and more representative of how they played on Friday. After winning Eastern Conference Player of the Month in December, superstar point guard Jalen Brunson spent his first press conference of the new year explaining his team’s lackluster effort.

“We just didn’t have it tonight. I know that’s a terrible, lame ass excuse,” the guard lamented, “but we let shotmaking affect our overall gameplay.”

The loss was the first leg of a back-to-back, with the Philadelphia 76ers coming to town for a Saturday night showdown. Whatever the reason for the Knicks’ Friday fiasco, they won’t have much time to turn it around. How much of a problem is that to Brown and the organization?

Brown is implementing the Knicks’ philosophical shift

The Knicks fired former head coach Tom Thibodeau with a press release that cited the organization’s ‘singular focus on winning a championship’ for its fans. While Thibodeau guided the team to its first Conference Finals berth in 25 years, the process that got them there was seemingly unacceptable.

Enter Brown, whose experience and willingness to collaborate with the front office were noted immediately. The coach’s media day discussions about relieving Brunson of some on-ball responsibility and leaning more into his depth were a welcome change for many fans.

Before dropping Friday night’s game to the Hawks, Brown effectively told reporters exactly why he had the microphone. He noted that while some of the team’s recent wins were admirable, they were not his kind of wins: sustainable.

“Our guys have- I give them credit, they’ve found ways to win. But at the end of the day, that’s not how we want to be. Or where we want to end up at,” the coach explained of recent victories.

Previously, the Knicks probably would have won Friday’s game. On December 29, 2024, Brunson played 44 minutes against the 5-23 Washington Wizards, pushing New York to an overtime win with 55 points. It boosted the “W” column in the standings, but did it actually help the Knicks’ championship hopes?

Brown sees things differently, treating the regular season as his laboratory to conduct experiments designed to help his staff optimize their postseason chances. Games like Friday’s represented a potentially inseparable reality of Brown’s methods. When the staff’s focus is on collecting data relevant to postseason pursuits, less attention is given to treating each regular season matchup like a Game 7.

That trade-off was appealing to fans over the summer. Is the grass really greener?

The Knicks are leaving little room for playoff disappointment

Intensity and a daily fervor for any kind of victory were foundational to Thibodeau’s tenure as head coach. The 55-year-old head coach admitted that winning each game doesn’t carry the same weight by acknowledging that his team had taken its foot off the proverbial gas.

“It’s human nature, when you have success, you tend to let down a little bit, especially when you’re playing and competing against the best in the world, so it’s human nature to kind of let go of the ropes a little bit from time to time,” Brown said on Friday. “Especially if you’re still finding ways to have success.”

After the Knicks lost Game 7 to the Indiana Pacers, concluding their 2024 season, Thibodeau shared wisdom with reporters that emanated from his do-or-die style. He declared that 29 non-Champions are disappointed each season and that it’s up to each team to ensure that, when the end of the year came, they did not have regrets.

For years, Knicks fans lamented their situation and could only hope that the next year might be different. Many spoke of their desire for a team that was not a perennial contender, but simply made them proud on a nightly basis. Fans did not need the Knicks to be the best. They just wanted a team that was proud to do its best. Thibodeau and Rose delivered that on practically a nightly basis.

Under Brown, Rose’s Knicks are taking the long view. They’re developing youth, keeping stars fresh, and focusing on the NBA Playoffs regardless of banner performances in Las Vegas. If it leads to a title, it’s difficult to imagine fans remembering the first loss of 2026.

If it doesn’t? Fans might head right back to caring about results more than the process. And they may not be the only people looking back on these losses with regret.

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