Karl-Anthony Towns Reflects on Blazing Fast Knicks Tenure

KAT's first three months with the New York Knicks have been up to scratch.

Gracing the cover of Slam gave Karl-Anthony Towns a chance to reflect on a whirlwind stretch that has turned him into one of the faces of New York basketball. He and the Knicks are less than four months removed from the high-profile trade with the Minnesota Timberwolves that sent him back to the tri-state area and he couldn't be happier with the early returns.

"It’s crazy you say it’s been a few months; it feels like yesterday," Towns, a New Jersey native, told Slam's Curtis Rowser III. "It’s awesome to be back home, to be with my family, see my grandmother and my aunts—a lot of my Dominican family still resides here in New York, so it’s really cool to be able to see them more often than I was able to when I was in Minnesota."

Towns has performed as advertised and then some since coming over from Minneapolis, averaging a 25.1-point, 13-9-rebound double-double. An early culmination of his efforts came on Thursday as Towns was among the 10 men chosen to start the 2025 NBA All-Star Game alongside teammate Jalen Brunson. It'll mark the fifth All-Star Game appearance of his career but his first as a starter.

All-Star nominations, however, are a relatively low form of metropolitan currency, and Towns is well-aware that he was brought in to end the Knicks' lengthy championship drought, one that recently reached five decades. Finding a way for the Knicks to get over that hump, he says, is his top priority.

"I just want to utilize all that experience and find ways to bring wins to Madison Square Garden and to the fans here," Towns said. "That’s what keeps me up at night: finding different ways to help this team, help my teammates be the best version of themselves and working on myself so I can be the best version of myself for my team.

Towns is certainly well-versed in postseason plateaus: last season, he headlined the Timberwolves first return to the Western Conference Finals since 2004, ending one of the longest such droughts in the Association. The Knicks' streak of 24 consecutive years without a conference finals appearance in the third-longest active tally in the NBA behind only Washington (45) and Charlotte (34).

The quest to get back continues on Saturday when Towns and the third-ranked Knicks (29-16) face the Sacramento Kings (7:30 p.m. ET, MSG).

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