Recap: Knicks 103, Wizards 87: Cavanaugh having his Maurice N’Dour game

The young Knicks wanted to play!

Perhaps the high expectations coming in to Summer League coupled with a Game 1 comeback getting derailed by an earthquake stuck in their collective craw. Maybe they lost all their money at the casino and needed to make some quick cash to pay down some debt. Whatever it was, this team came out with an edge the past two games. It’s a real smash-and-grab group. Even Kevin Knox ramped up his typically low-pulsing energy.

The star of the night was probably a toss up between RJ Barrett, who narrowly fell short of a triple-double, and... Tyler Cavanaugh! I mean, let’s be honest, game ball goes to Cavanaugh, because he was phenomenal. There were wonderful contributions up and down the lineup, though. Mitchell Robinson was parried with Kenny Wooten. Kevin Knox and Iggy Brazdeikis packed in some two-way dishes to the buffet. Mangia!

• Knox tried to kill someone with a dunk right away. He was just a finger tip too short and the ball sprung up off the rim. Playing with force has been his mode this summer. That needs to carry over to training camp and beyond.
• Barrett came out ready to hurt ’em too. He made a fantastic baseline step-through drive to run two defenders into one another for the finish. Barrett has been a quick study this Summer League, and he’ll continue to hit some road blocks, but he has been active if not productive. That’s good and could be great.
• Isiah Thomas commentating is disgusting. That time when he tonelessly started to sing “It’s a Small World” can go directly to hell.
• Knox late in the second quarter had a sequence with three great defensive efforts and a beautiful pass. Two near-blocks, a steal and the push. Have loved seeing this assertive version of Kevin Knox. In the beginning of the game there was one off-a-sleight-of-hand little scoopy-oop pass to Robinson. Check it out at the top of this video below, along with all varietals of aggression on both ends as a defender, scorer and even as a passer. Knox II: force edition.

• Tyler Cavanaugh is out here trying to make all the extra passes and fill all the lanes. He’s gonna get that invite to vet camp. And he’s gonna kill Julius Randle’s minutes, so that he gets to keep them when we roll into the season. In one run, Cavanaugh (cursed name, I know) nearly had three consecutive and-1’s.
• The Igloo keeps jamming little punks on the block and dangling bigs out on the perimeter. Hall of fame confirmed. Look at Brazdeikis bury this little dude and hit the trampoline man on the cut.

• Kenny. Wooten. He swatted every damn thing. A couple times he didn’t get the spike, but he freaked the Wizards out. At one point he blocked the muscles off of Admiral Schofield.
• By the way, Schofield sucks and I personally love this fact because he is the opposite of Knox. Schofield is all muscle and no aggression, Knox is all elbows and is letting it all hang out.
• Another noteworthy event! Rui Hachimura didn’t play because he is, in fact, a coward.
• The only problem with Mitch is that he catches or guides in all sorts of lobs that come his way. Good, bad, ugly. He does it so easily that the team starts to try lobbing silly stuff to guys that don’t have the same lift. Barrett got his ass hung out to dry one time. Can’t be so careless.
• If Mitchell could clench the ball with his cheeks, he would be able to dunk with his butt.
• Speaking of hind parts, RJ Barrett slapped his own ass after a play, and we here at Posting and Toasting support this type of spirit.
• The idea of Wooten blocking everything is really rubbing my belly and patting my head right now.
• Lamar Peters got to go, bro. Get him outta here. VJ King even moreso, he’s Lance Thomas all over again. I would rather have current day Robert Pack and Keith Bogans.

Summer League gives me a smile and then I’m trapped up in its magic. Now it’s time to go. We’ll see you again some other time. Stay tuned, though! We got some tricks up our sleeves.