James Harden snapped out of his early-season slump in a big way Wednesday night, scoring a season-high 32 points to lead the Cleveland Cavaliers to a 115-107 win over the New York Knicks at Madison Square Garden, Reuters reported.
The win ended Cleveland’s five-game losing streak against the Knicks, a skid dating to the Eastern Conference finals in May, when New York swept the series on its way to the franchise’s first NBA title in 53 years, according to Reuters.
Harden, 37, had scored more than 20 points just once in the first 11 games of the season before Wednesday’s outburst, Reuters reported. He put Cleveland ahead for good on a fourth-quarter 3-pointer with 4:22 remaining, breaking a 101-101 tie.
Donovan Mitchell added 23 points, seven rebounds and six assists for the Cavaliers, who won for just the second time in six games this month, according to Reuters. Jarrett Allen recorded a double-double with 11 points and 14 rebounds, while Tyrese Proctor scored 15 and Meleek Thomas 14 off the bench.
For New York, Jalen Brunson scored 27 points and Karl-Anthony Towns posted 21 points, 11 rebounds and eight assists — his 11th double-double in as many games this season, Reuters reported. Miles McBride added 19 points off the bench as the Knicks fell to 6-5.
The Knicks trailed by 12 in the first quarter and led just twice, but erased a 10-point fourth-quarter deficit before Harden’s go-ahead three, according to Reuters. Cleveland scored the next six points after Brunson’s answering bucket and never led by fewer than five over the final 93 seconds, with Allen’s three-point play pushing the margin to 113-105 with 29.6 seconds left.
Cleveland, now 6-6, finishes its road trip Friday with an NBA Cup game at Miami, an 8 p.m. tipoff, according to Hoops Wire’s recap of the win.
The performance was a sharp answer to a difficult week of questions around the Cavaliers. NBA insider Marc Stein had flagged head coach Kenny Atkinson’s future as a situation to watch after Cleveland’s 5-6 start, Heavy reported, and Harden’s own slow start — a career-low shooting mark through the opening weeks, according to Heavy — had drawn criticism before his breakout night at the Garden.
Photo: Erik Drost, CC BY