Brunson scores 25, late basket lifts Knicks over Magic

ORLANDO,Fla. (AP) — Jalen Brunson scored 25 points and made the go-aheadbasket with 1:13 left, Julius Randle had 22 points and 14 reboundsand the New York Knicks beat the Orlando Magic 102-98 Tuesdaynight.

Brunson’srunning bank shot put the Knicks up for good at 94-93 in a gamethey played almost entirely from behind. He then fed Jericho Simsfor a dunk and a three-point lead with 40 seconds left.

“We keepputting ourselves in this position of coming back from deficits,”said Brunson, who had 10 points and two assists in the fourthquarter. “On the flip side of that we kept fighting, but we’ve gotto start games better.”

The teamscombined to shoot 10 free throws in the final 7.7 seconds. The onlymiss was by Orlando’s Paolo Banchero, who intentionally tried toset up a tying basket with 2.3 seconds remaining.

MarkelleFultz led the Magic with 21 points. Franz Wagner added 18 pointsand Banchero finished with 16 points after being held to four inthe first half.

“Everypossession matters and I think we got good experience of thattonight,” Fultz said. “We came up short but I’m happy with the waywe fought. A couple of things cost us down he stretch.”

Accordingto Magic coach Jamahl Mosley, those things were “shooting 6 for 25(3-pointers), missing a couple of free throws, and giving up 11offensive rebounds.”

ImmanuelQuickley came off the New York bench with 18 points.

Wagner madehis first five shots, two of them on a 10-0 run that gave Orlando a12-point lead midway through the second quarter, the largest leadfor either team.

“We startedoff in a hole and we fought out of the hole,” Knicks coach TomThibodeaux said. “I thought in the second half we were a lotbetter, and I thought in the fourth quarter we were very good.”

Back-to-back 3-pointers by Randle erased most of that lead, but theKnicks went scoreless for the final 2:20 of the first half and fellbehind 48-40.

Two basketsby Quickley helped New York close the third quarter on a 7-0 run,and when Randle and Quickly opened the fourth quarter with 3s, theKnicks had their first lead since 2-0. They scored 36 in the fourthquarter, shooting 12 for 19 (63.2%).

“I thoughtJulius and Jalen set the tone in the fourth quarter. Just the waywe closed - big rebounds, physicality, hustle plays,” Thibodeauxsaid.

“That’swhat it came down to in the end,” Randle said. “We made our freethrows, got rebounds and didn’t turn the ball over.”

TIP-INS

Knicks: FRJ Barrett, who did not play Sunday due to illness, started andplayed 35 minutes. He missed nine of his first 10 shots butfinished with 15 points. . . . C Mitchell Robinson missed his 10thgame after having surgery on a fractured right thumb. ... C IsaiahHartenstein had five fouls in 13 minutes. Brunson and Barrett alsofinished with five fouls.

Magic: Thehome crowd of 19,438 was the third-largest in Magic history. ... CMo Bamba sat out the second game of a four-game suspension for hisinvolvement in an altercation at Minnesota on Friday night. ...FChuma Okeke, out since late November with a knee injury, has beenassigned to Lakeland of the G League.

TRADE WINDS

Playingtheir final game before Thursday’s trade deadline, the Knicksdidn’t seem to be in the mood for changes.

“Our job isto show up and play basketball and let the front office deal withthose situations,” Brunson said. “But I love my teammates. Therelationships I’ve made in the last couple of months have beenspecial, and that’s all I can say.”

SaidThibodeaux: “I love our team. We know we have a and we have a lotof young players that are going to get better as time goes on. I’vebeen around a long time and for every 100 trades they talk about,one gets done. So it’s just noise.”