Mikal Bridges‘ basketball skills were not their best on Monday, so he relied on his football knowledge instead to make the game-saving play in the New York Knicks‘ 108-105 overtime victory against the Boston Celtics in Game 1 of their second-round series.
Bridges, who finished with just eight points on 3 of 13 from the field, made a number of huge defensive plays in overtime. None were bigger than his steal on the Celtics’ final possession, when they had a chance to tie the game and force a second overtime.
With only three seconds remaining, the Celtics didn’t have much time as they took the ball out of bounds along the sideline. Derrick White lobbed a pass across the court to Jaylen Brown, who was hoping to catch it and rise up immediately into a shot. The pass was slightly off line, however, and Bridges reached in and ripped the ball away before Brown could even have a chance to shoot.
“I was just watching his eyes,” Bridges told reporters. “I’m a football fan.”
“I’m just watching (Brown’s) eyes and following where the ball is at. (I’m) trying to get my hands up as soon as I see the ball because we’re up by 3, so we’re trying to foul. Just trying to get the ball and see where his eyes are going to lead me and get the ball.”
The Knicks trailed by 20 points in the middle of the third quarter, but were able to cut the deficit to single digits heading into the fourth. They eventually took the lead, and were up by as many as six late in the fourth before the Celtics battled back to tie things up with less than a minute to play. The Knicks could, and perhaps should, have won in regulation, but Jalen Brunson’s floater just before the final buzzer somehow rattled out.
In overtime, the Knicks again went ahead by six, thanks in large part to Bridges, who finished with two steals and a block in the extra frame. He also hit an absurd 3-pointer with 2:30 remaining that he somehow banked in from the corner. However it happened, Bridges and the Knicks weren’t complaining.
“The basketball gods blessed me for just staying with it,” Bridges said.
Bridges and the Knicks will be back in action on Wednesday for Game 2 against a Celtics team that will be desperate to tie the series up at 1-1.
