LOS ANGELES — Before the Giannis Antetokounmpo controversy in Indiana, Julius Randle never thought much of the game ball.
The Knicks, as a whole, don’t seem wrapped up in memorabilia.
But they watched Antetokounmpo, one of the league’s top stars, throw a fit over the Pacers taking his 64-point ball earlier in the week, prompting what felt like an international incident.
It heightened awareness over game balls, with Randle especially.
“To be completely honest, I’ve never cared about it,” Randle said. “Now I do.”
So Randle and RJ Barrett plotted on the bench after Brunson converted his 50th point Friday night.
It wasn’t enough that Ryan Arcidiacono, a 6-foot-2 reserve Knicks guard, was in the game and had possession after the final buzzer.
“I don’t trust Ryan with the game ball,” Randle said. “They might look at him and think, ‘We can take that.’ I had to make sure I got it, and I secured it.”
The ball went from Arcidiacono to Randle to Brunson to Barrett to Brunson’s locker.
At some point it’ll probably go to Rick Brunson, the Knicks assistant coach and father to the team’s point guard.
Jalen has a space for his 7,500-piece Lego construction of the Millennium Falcon.
But Rick keeps the basketball stuff.
“You’re going to have to ask my dad,” said Jalen, who handed off the game ball soon after it. “I don’t have anything in my house.”
Despite the apathy toward Friday night’s Wilson ball, Brunson will probably never find one with a more powerful connection to his shooting desires.
His historic performance, the first 50-point game of Brunson’s career, included a perfect 9-for-9 on 3-pointers.
He shot, amazingly, 12-for-12 in the second half with 35 points.
It meant Brunson can add the following to his increasingly impressive resume:
Watching the Knicks’ 139-122 victory over the Suns unfold, it didn’t seem like Brunson was in the midst of a historical performance.
There was nothing extra about the attempts.
They weren’t forced or spectacular or acrobatic.
As Barrett noted, it just kind of happened.
“I think the crazy part about it was — he was hot, obviously, but it wasn’t like crazy,” Barrett said. “It was just regular shots he takes every night. He just ended up making all of them.”
The Knicks were all smiles and celebrations in the postgame, a sense of relief after a dud in Utah two nights earlier and a three-day trip to L.A. on the horizon.
Perhaps more telling was the reaction afterward from Phoenix’s Kevin Durant, who harped on the Knicks’ focus
It sounded like a subliminal message to his own team, the struggling Suns (13-12), after Durant shot 1-for-5 in the fourth quarter.
“They all support him. They put in sets for him, they run plays for him,” Durant said. “When he gets hot, they continue to give him the ball.”
Indeed, the Knicks made sure to get Brunson the ball. Even after the game was over.
Unlike with Antetokounmpo — who felt compelled to retrieve the from the Pacers locker room — the Knicks knew they had the authentic game ball.
“Everybody knows what happened with Giannis,” Barrett said. “J.B. had 50, so we had to give it to him.”