There is only so much a team can accomplish in January, when the focus is on process over results and the early jockeying for playoff positioning begins.
But if a dead-of-winter statement can be made, consider it made: The new-look Knicks are not just winning games but beating teams with deep résumés — and beating them soundly.
In back-to-back games, the Knicks have demolished the reigning NBA champions and outlasted the reigning Eastern Conference champions, respectively.
After crushing the Nuggets on Thursday, the Knicks responded by pulling away from the Heat, 125-109, on Saturday afternoon at a rocking Garden — a feel-good win marred by a worrisome Julius Randle injury.
The best feelings around the Knicks in maybe a decade were replaced by fear at 4:27 of the fourth quarter, when Randle bulled his way to the hoop and Miami’s Jaime Jaquez Jr. attempted to draw a charge.
Randle barreled into Jaquez and hit the floor hard, remaining there in clear pain.
The notoriously tough forward did not take his free throws.
He slumped to the locker room as his teammates closed out another win.
There was no immediate update on his condition.
The Knicks (29-17) have won six straight and 12 in 14 games since OG Anunoby arrived, leapfrogging the idle Cavs for fourth place in the conference.
Tom Thibodeau’s crew couldn’t outdo a 38-point destruction of Denver, but they will settle for a run-of-the-mill smacking of the team that knocked them out of the Eastern Conference semifinals a season ago.
The Heat (24-22) — losers of six straight — are trying to find their way back.
Maybe with Anunoby complementing the two-way forces that are Jalen Brunson and Randle along with a strong supporting cast, the Knicks have found themselves, health-willing.
The Knicks trailed by as many as 10 points in the first quarter and didn’t lead for the first time until early in the second, but they took control of the game with Brunson (32 points) leading a balanced attack.
The Heat, led by Jimmy Butler (28 points), turned what had been a 13-point deficit into a tie game by beating up on Knicks reserves late in the third quarter.
But Randle nailed a 3 at the end of the period, and the Knicks kept up the momentum from there with a strong fourth.