One Stat Shows How Historically Bad The New York Knicks Collapse Against The Dallas Mavericks Was

Luka Doncic against the New York Knicks

Getty Image / Tim Heitman


Everything was going so well for the New York Knicks for a second there.

Just a week ago, they had won 8 games in a row to put themselves back into playoff contention and were playing some of the league’s best basketball.

The past week has been an entirely different story. It started with a loss at home against the Toronto Raptors where Pascal Siakam posted an incredible 52-9-7 stat line. Then they dropped another one at home. This time it was a buzzer-beater from DeMar DeRozan that sank the Knicks against a struggling Chicago Bulls team.

Then came Christmas Day. The Knicks jumped out to an early lead against the Philadelphia 76ers in the opening game of the NBA’s Christmas festivities and they held that lead for almost the entirety of the first 3 quarters. The 76ers chipped away throughout the game and took over in the 4th quarter to hand the Knicks a 3rd consecutive loss.

They weren’t expected to put a stop to that skid last night as they headed to Dallas to take on the Mavericks without Jalen Brunson, but they found themselves in position to get the win late in the game.

The seemingly had the game locked up with 33.2 seconds left after a pair of Miles McBride free throws put them ahead by 9. However, the Mavs weren’t quite done.

The Mavs went on a 12-3 in those last 33.2 seconds, capped off by a Luka Doncic jumper after he grabbed the rebound on his own missed free throw, to send the game into overtime.

The Mavs went on to win by 5 in OT.

It was a devastating collapse for the Knicks and it turns out the loss was historically bad. The last 13,884 teams who held leads of at least 9 with 35 or less seconds remaining had all closed their opponents out.

While it was a historically bad collapse from the New York Knicks, it came at the hands of a historically great performance from Luka Doncic. He became the first player ever to post a 60/20/10 stat line as he led the Mavs to a 4th consecutive win.

Luckily for the Knicks, they have a couple of winnable games left on this Texas road trip to try and get back on track.