INDIANAPOLIS — Karl-Anthony Towns was down bad.
After spending the bulk of the fourth quarter of the New York Knicks’ Game 2 loss to the Indiana Pacers on the bench, watching his teammates try to climb out of a hole that he’d helped dig with missed shots and defensive lapses, he’d compounded the trouble in Game 3, missing 6 of 8 field-goal attempts with four fouls and four turnovers. Towns was far from the only Knick misfiring, though: Jalen Brunson and Mikal Bridges were a combined 10-for-30, emblematic of a game full of clanks and cough-ups that had at one point pushed the Pacers up by 20 and had New York down 10 heading into the fourth quarter.
“The game wasn’t looking great for me,” Towns said. “For all of us.”
Fortunately for Towns, and the rest of the Knicks, they play 48 minutes at the NBA level. And that gave Towns, and the rest of the Knicks, one more chance — 12 more minutes in which to do something to avoid going down 3-0.
“Fourth quarter’s different,” he said. “Feels like a whole ’nother game.”
Man, did it ever.
In less than 12 minutes, Towns changed the Knicks’ fortunes and maybe saved their season. He was brilliant when New York needed it most, pouring in 20 of his 24 points in the final frame to spark yet another unbelievable comeback in these 2025 NBA playoffs, erasing a 20-point deficit and propelling the Knicks to a 106-100 Game 3 win that stunned the throngs of Pacers faithful that had entered the final quarter ready to bust out their brooms and exited it wondering if New York might wind up being a tough out after all.
“I mean, KAT, when he get in that zone like that, it’s gonna be tough to stop him,” Knicks wing Mikal Bridges said. “And we needed every single point that he gave us in that fourth quarter. I’m just happy he’s on our side.”
After Knicks guard Miles McBride missed a layup on the opening possession of the fourth quarter, newly minted reserve Josh Hart came soaring in to grab the offensive rebound and kicked the ball out to Towns, waiting at the top of the key. And suddenly, seven quarters of struggles — with his shot, with the Pacers’ persistent hunting on the defensive end, with the noise that attends underperformance on the big stage when you wear orange and blue — melted away.
“Just have to let the last game, and even those three quarters, go,” Towns said. “Just focus on giving yourself a chance to win the game.”
Towns stepped into the shot with confidence, without hesitation, and drilled it. Less than a minute later, he drove hard to the middle on Pacers center Myles Turner before pirouetting with a beautiful drop step to the baseline to finish off the glass. With those two baskets, he’d more than doubled his scoring total; more than that, he’d found some rhythm, some flow, a melody in the cacophony of a ravenous Gainbridge Fieldhouse. And with it?
“I just saw an opportunity,” he said. “Saw an opportunity to utilize all those hours I put into the gym.”
Towns took all that work and gave it directly to the Pacers, injecting new life into a previously moribund Knicks offense and giving a heartbeat to a team that seemed to be ready for last rites when a Tyrese Haliburton steal and slam put Indiana up by 20 with just over three minutes to go in the second quarter.
Then again, maybe we should’ve known better. Maybe, as they showed in Round 2 against Boston, going down by 20 just activates the Knicks’ superpowers.
“Yeah, I don’t know — I would love to not be down 20,” Hart said with a smile in the Knicks’ locker room. “But I guess we were down 20, and then we were up 17 [in Game 1]. So maybe if we’re in the middle of that, maybe if we’re up like 10 or something, it could be a good situation.”
Once again, for whatever reason, a massive deficit proved to be a good situation for the Knicks on Sunday. With 2 1/2 minutes to go in the third quarter, New York trailed by 15; with four minutes left in the fourth, New York led by four, thanks largely to Towns, who outscored the Pacers by himself in the first eight minutes of the fourth quarter, 20-12, ushering in a sea change on the scoreboard by punishing the Pacers all over the offensive end of the court