This was not about a moral victory.
It wasn’t about taking solace in anything after a hard-fought series.
Jalen Brunson wanted to make that clear.
He didn’t view the Knicks reaching the Eastern Conference finals for the first time in 25 years as any sort of achievement.
The Knicks captain, however, felt it was appropriate to acknowledge what went right this year for the Knicks, even if they fell six wins short of their ultimate goal.
“I’m not sure ‘accomplished’ is the word I would use here, but I think the way this team progressed this year, for me it was fun,” Brunson said after the Knicks were eliminated by the Pacers in six games Saturday night. “There were a lot of people saying we couldn’t do a lot of things. A lot of negativity around what we were trying to accomplish and the way we put blinders on and went to work, that’s something I was proud of with this team. I’m proud of how we stayed the course.”
The Knicks had a strong regular season, winning 51 games, their most since the 2012-13 season.
Despite that, they entered the playoffs mostly an afterthought as far as contenders go, largely due to their 0-8 record against the top two seeds in the East, the defending champion Celtics and Cavaliers.
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But the Knicks stunned Boston in the second round, rallying from 20-point deficits at TD Garden in each of the first two games.
They played deeper into the spring than expected.
In the losing locker room, there was frustration and disappointment, but also optimism for the future.
A belief that there is more to come from this group.
It was their first year together, Karl-Anthony Towns and Mikal Bridges joining the Brunson-led core that also included Mitchell Robinson, OG Anunoby, Josh Hart and Miles McBride.
That entire group is under contract next season, and Brunson believes it can take the next step together.
“The most confident. Overconfident. Seriously,” Brunson said. “There’s not an ounce of any type of doubt that I’m not confident with this group.
“We have a lot of guys who are on this team, and I feel like you guys always ask, ‘what do you work on whenever you come back?’ and stuff like that,” he added. “And from what I’ve seen, no one’s really out there posting themselves about the things that they do. We have a lot of guys that just genuinely want to work hard to be better, and I like that, and I appreciate my teammates and everything they do and everything they believe in.”
