Knicks' Karl-Anthony Towns has taken a more active role in facilitating club's offense

It is still a part of NBA postseason lore. Magic Johnson, one of the all-time great point guards, switched over to center for Game 7 of the 1980 NBA Finals to help the Los Angeles Lakers to a title, taking the jump ball and dominating every aspect of the game.

So should we be so surprised that Karl-Anthony Towns, who grew up idolizing Johnson and has become one of the best shooting big men in NBA history, would make the switch in the other direction? While he may not be playing the role of Johnson, he has suddenly stopped shooting and has served as a point-center, orchestrating the Knicks offense.

It was just over two weeks ago that the Knicks were searching for answers. Mike Brown was fielding the questions and dodging talk about lineup changes - not to mention the pair of one-point losses to Atlanta that were forcing hard conversations about his own status.

Behind closed doors, Brown and the Knicks ignored the talk and got to work. And in the spotlight, with a microscope focused on him, Brown and his staff made a decision — changing up a system that they’d worked all season to refine and putting the ball in the hands of Towns as a playmaking hub.

While he has always flashed passing acumen, Towns averaged just three assists game this season and 3.3 in the first three games of the playoffs.

Placing his reputation on a high wire with a seven-foot center handling the ball, easing the burden on Jalen Brunson, who had been the focus of the Atlanta defense, Brown took a risk. That may be hard to recall now as the results have the Knicks suddenly emerging as a machine, destroying every defense in its path.

And at the center of it has been the center — Towns.

In last year’s postseason run, Towns had just 24 assists against 40 turnovers in 18 games. This time, in just 10 games, he has handed out 66 assists with just 28 turnovers.

“Just to see my teammates being special and to be able to get them involved is something I truly enjoy more than hitting a shot,” Towns said earlier in the run. “Just to see people like OG [Anunoby] consistently making the right read on the cut, the back door, whatever the case may be against the defense and doing something special, it brings me joy and it brings me the most energy.”

“He’s a special talent,” Anunoby added. “He can do it all. And I know if I get open, he’ll find me. No matter how tight the window is, he’ll be able to find it. It’s amazing playing with a player like him.”

In Game 4 against the Hawks, Towns emerged with a triple-double — the first of his postseason career — and the Knicks took the game and evened the series, starting a run of seven straight victories. In that run Towns has put up numbers that might have seemed unimaginable a few weeks ago. It’s not scoring - after all, he has put up 60-point nights in his career - but the handing out of assists that have shifted the Knicks.

Consider some of these numbers. Towns, including the three first games of the opening round, had never had more than five assists in any of his 53 career playoff games. In the last seven games, he has had at least six in every one, including 10 three times, two of them part of a triple-double performance.

“I think the more we’ve played together as a team, the more we’ve grown,” Brunson said. “And we’ve continued to get better. And it’s a chemistry thing. It’s a feel thing. It’s how things get better. Things get better over time.”

The move made sense, even if it was a bold decision. While there may be no Brunson “stopper,” in Dyson Daniels the Hawks had at least a “make it difficult for” Brunson defender, and the game plan was to frustrate and harass Brunson. But without a true center, they had no one who could match up with Towns when the ball was in his hands.

In those final three games of the Atlanta series Towns averaged 16 points, 8.7 assists and 11.7 rebounds, helping the Knicks to victories by 16, 29 and finally 51 points. Against Philadelphia it might have seemed wise to shift back to the original focus, with former MVP Joel Embiid lined up at center. But in just 23 minutes per game (thanks to foul trouble, combined with three one-sided wins emptying the bench early) Towns put up 15.5 points and 7.5 assists — efficient whether he shot it or passed it, shooting 61.8% in the series, including 54.5% from three.

The Knicks traded for Towns for his scoring ability, but after putting up 14.4 field goal attempts per game in his first 53 playoff games, he has put up just 7.9 in this seven-game streak, while handing out more assists than shots — 8.0 per game.

“We made a lot of moves throughout the course of the year and throughout the course of the playoffs, and you just keep trying to do what's best for the team,” Brown said. “I don't care what team I'm with when you're talking about being in the NBA. Even if you do stuff right, you're going to get criticized. So you just embrace whatever's out there, and you keep trying to do what's best for the team.”

“Well, there’s no criticism because we didn’t give him a chance to get it,” Towns said. “Shout out to our team. We found a way to, in a way, stabilize our season and do what was needed to adjust to Atlanta and found ourselves in a better position. It’s a shout out to the coaching staff for realizing adjustments that needed to be made and also shout out to me personally that they trusted me.”