The Knicks are back in the NBA Finals for the first time in 27 years, a fact that probably wouldn’t have been possible without Jalen Brunson.
But that doesn’t seem to be enough for Becky Hammon to change her stance on him. At least not yet.
The Las Vegas Aces head coach told reporters Tuesday that she is ready to be “proven wrong” about Brunson after previously saying he didn’t measure up to be a “1A dude.”
“I speak from experience,” Hammon said Tuesday, according to the Associated Press. “Allen Iverson got MVP, and he lost in the finals. I think the two best teams are probably in the West, but I’m up for being proven wrong. That’s the other thing, I think Jalen Brunson’s a hell of a player, a hell of a player. I’m speaking historically on the NBA with what I said. I don’t know why everybody’s so stuck on that. I said it two years ago.
“I said what I said. If he proves me wrong, he proves me wrong.”
In December 2023, during an appearance on ESPN’s “NBA Today,” Hammon, the former WNBA star player who has won three of the past four titles as a coach, said the Knicks were stuck in the second tier of teams that didn’t have quite enough to win an NBA championship. Part of that, according to Hammon, was that Brunson — listed at 6-foot-2 — was not the caliber of star needed to reach the next level.
“They don’t have enough personnel, they don’t have the manpower that they need to hang with those guys,” Hammon said then. “I think you’re going to get a consistent team like they’ve been, they’re a pretty good team.
“They’re, they’re well-coached, they’re going to be on their defensive game, but at the end of the day, they don’t have a dude. You gotta have a dude, you gotta have a 1A dude and they’re missing that at the end of the day if we’re just getting down to brass tacks.”
Since then, the Brunson-led Knicks — with two different head coaches (Tom Thibodeau and Mike Brown) — have reached the playoffs three times, twice getting to the Eastern Conference finals and breaking through to get to the NBA Finals this year.
Brunson has averaged 26.9 points and 6.6 assists per game in this postseason and scored more than 30 points twice in the four-game sweep of the Cavaliers in the conference finals, including a 38-point effort in the Knicks’ historic Game 1 comeback. He took home MVP honors for the series.
“The belief that the organization has in me has been amazing, and something I don’t take for granted, and something not a lot of people get the opportunity to do,” Brunson said after clinching the finals berth. “So I’m very thankful. It’s an honor to be here in this city for this organization with my teammates.”
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