Knicks complete sweep, tie NBA playoff record with 25 three-pointers

The Knicks didn’t just close out the 76ers. They detonated the series. New York beat Philadelphia 144-114 in Game 4 on Sunday, hit 25 threes, and turned what should have been a tense road closeout into a three-hour statement. That matters because closeout games usually get ugly. This one got absurd instead — and now the Knicks are back in the Eastern Conference finals for a second straight year. ### Why did this game feel over so fast? Because New York basically won the geometry battle in the first quarter. Philadelphia scored first, then the Knicks ripped off a 20-4 run, hit 11 threes in the opening period, and pushed the lead to 20 before the quarter even ended. Once that happened, the Sixers were chasing a math problem they never solved. (nba.com) ### Why do 25 threes matter so much? Because that isn’t just “they shot well.” That tied the most made threes by any team in an NBA playoff game, and New York did it on 25-for-44 shooting — 57% from deep. The Knicks also set a franchise record for threes in any game, regular season or playoffs. When one team makes 17 more threes than the other, almost everything else stops mattering. (nba.com) ### Who swung it besides Jalen Brunson? Miles McBride was the jolt. He started again for injured OG Anunoby, went 7-for-9 from three, hit four of those in the first quarter, and finished with 25 points. Brunson had 22, while Josh Hart and Karl-Anthony Towns added 17 each, but McBride was the guy who made Philadelphia’s early defensive choices look hopeless. (nba.com) ### Was this just one crazy shooting night? Not really — that’s the scary part for everyone else. The Knicks also hit 19 threes at 51% in Game 1, and this was already their seventh double-digit win of the postseason. Through two rounds, they’re winning by 19.4 points per game, which is the biggest margin at this stage since the NBA went to a 16-team playoff format in 1984. That starts to look less like variance and more like a team peaking at exactly the right time. (nba.com) ### What was Philadelphia’s actual problem? The Sixers weren’t awful everywhere. At halftime they had scored more in the paint, more from midrange, and more at the line — and they were still down 24. That’s the modern version of getting buried. New York took more than half its first-half shots from three and made 18 of 29. It’s like trying to win a race by jogging the corners while the other team keeps finding shortcuts. (nba.com) ### Does the road setting make this louder? Yes — because the building sounded weirdly pro-Knicks. New York fans showed up in huge numbers again in Philadelphia, and the game turned into a rolling celebration by the third quarter. That gave the blowout an extra layer of embarrassment for the Sixers and made the sweep feel even more final. ### So what changed for these Knicks? (nba.com) They look more ruthless. Last season’s run felt like a breakthrough. This one feels more deliberate. Mike Brown has them at seven straight playoff wins, and the profile is extreme on both ends — swarming defense, fast decisions, and enough shooting to turn a decent defensive possession into a loss anyway. ### Bottom line (nba.com) The headline is the 25 threes, but the bigger story is control. New York didn’t survive this series. New York owned it. And when a team sweeps a second-round opponent by doing something historic, the conference finals stop feeling like a reward and start feeling like the next test of something real.