The young Knicks arrived in Las Vegas intent on leaving their mark. They talked about winning a title and returning home with some fresh bling. Personal development and individual goals were an afterthought.
They made it pretty far — all the way to Sunday afternoon’s championship game. But they came up short against the one team they couldn’t solve — the Trail Blazers — in an 85-77 defeat at the Thomas and Mack Center.
The Knicks wound up going 3-2 during the trip, and received strong performances from a number of players, most notably second-year players Quentin Grimes, Miles McBride and Jericho Sims, who signed a three-year deal with the Knicks during the extended trip.
“It’s still basketball,” Sims said after the Knicks’ second victory, when asked of the significance of summer league “We have to pretend like we’re playing with the main roster. It’s the same thing, just a different time.”
There is a chance this was the last time Grimes and McBride play for the Knicks. The two second-year guards could end up in a package for Donovan Mitchell, the Jazz’s three-time All-Star guard.
The two teams are discussing a deal for the star from Elmsford, N.Y., and on top of several first-round picks, rebuilding Utah is interested in the Knicks’ young players, such as Obi Toppin, Immanuel Quickley, Grimes and McBride.
The Jazz are said to be high on the 6-foot-4 Grimes, who averaged 21.4 points, 4.2 rebounds, 4.0 assists and shot 41 percent from the floor in a sterling series of performances in Sin City. McBride, a second-round pick a year ago, was pretty good in his own right, posting 16.8 points and 5.0 assists while shooting 50 percent. The two certainly didn’t hurt their stock in leading the Knicks, coached by assistant Dice Yoshimoto, to the title game. But they couldn’t carry the summer league Knicks all the way.
Brandon Williams, who spent time with the Knicks G-League affiliate in Westchester last year, led the Trail Blazers with 22 points and five assists and summer league MVP Trendon Watford, the former LSU star entering his second year as a pro, had 19 points, seven rebounds and three steals. Grimes scored 19 points for the Knicks, but made just 2 of 11 3-point attempts, and McBride had 17.
Like the first meeting in Las Vegas between the two teams, the Knicks started well. They held a two-point lead after one quarter. But just like in that first encounter, the Trail Blazers took command after the opening stanza.
Portland outscored the Knicks, 29-16, in the second quarter and held the Knicks to 31 points in the middle two quarters. Portland led by as many as 16 points late in the third quarter, before the Knicks rallied to cut the deficit to seven early in the fourth.
They didn’t have anything left, though, to come all the way back as the Trail Blazers quickly pushed the lead back into double figures.
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