Pacers Game Preview: Who Are The New York Knicks?
The Indiana Pacers will play NBA basketball on Tuesday.
Yes, that is right, after losing to the Washington Wizards on May 20 to end their 2020-21 season just one game shy of the postseason, they will resume action 138 days later.
However, this game won't actually count.
The Pacers are playing the New York Knicks in New York City at Madison Square Garden on Tuesday evening for both team's first preseason game of the year.
Who are the Knicks?
After missing the NBA Playoffs for nearly a decade, the Knicks found themselves back in the postseason last year.
They didn't just squeak in either.
They were the fourth seed in the Eastern Conference and had home-court advantage.
Julius Randle made his first trip to the All-Star game, and Tom Thibodeau (in his first season as Knicks head coach) won the NBA's Coach of The Year Award.
They, however, did lose in five games to the Atlanta Hawks in the first round of the playoffs, but at the end of the day they still had a season that beat everyone's expectations.
This season, they bring back most of the same roster and will hopefully see more growth from Randle (only 26 years old) and 2019 third overall pick R.J. Barrett.
In addition, they added four-time All-Star Kemba Walker, who is a New York native and will probably be very motivated after missing the All-Star game last year for the first time since 2016.
If the Pacers want to make noise in the Eastern Conference this season, the Knicks are one of the teams they will for sure be competing with in the standings.
Many teams do not play all of their players during the preseason, so it's yet to be determined who will be playing for the Knicks (see Tweet below from Tony East of Forbes about the Pacers injury report for the game).
Tweets from Fred Katz of The Athletic and Tommy Beer of Forbes can be seen below about what is known about the Knicks injury report.
Beer notes that Mitchell Robinson will not play.
The game preview from the Pacers website can be read here.
The Knicks are 2-point favorites, according to FanDuel.
