Karl-Anthony Towns’ involvement in the Knicks offense has been one of the biggest storylines all year and likely will continue to be the rest of the season.
It doesn’t take a microscope to see that he is less comfortable in coach Mike Brown’s system compared to last year under Tom Thibodeau.
Way too many times, Towns goes long stretches on the floor and hardly is noticeable offensively.
During the Knicks’ blowout loss to the Pistons on Thursday night at Madison Square Garden, Towns scored just two points on three shots in 15 minutes during the first half.
Particularly puzzling was that the Pistons were playing without their top two centers in Jalen Duren and Isaiah Stewart, both serving suspensions.
If anything, it was a game Towns should have been featured in the offensive game plan and aggressive from the outset.
“Our offense is our offense,” Towns said. “It’s been that way all year. So we have our system, and we’re gonna — regardless of who’s in the game or not in the game — we run the system that we have implemented for our team to the best of our abilities.”
Then, all of a sudden, Towns came out of halftime noticeably hunting for his shot and forcing the issue.
He took five shots and five free throws and scored 12 points in the third quarter.
That’s the way it’s largely been for Towns this year — nothing has been natural or in the flow of the offense.
He’s usually been troublingly uninvolved or overly aggressive, with very little in between.
“We’re continuing to try to do different things to help free him up,” Brown said. “We’ll continue to search to try to do different things to free him up throughout the rest of the year.”
Towns’ production and efficiency are down this year.
His marks of 19.8 points per game and 34.9 percent shooting from 3-point range would represent the lowest since his rookie season, and his 46.7 percent shooting from the field would be the worst of his career.
He is taking just 14 shots per game, which also would be in line for the fewest of his 11-year career.
The problem isn’t going away.
If anything, as the postseason gets closer and closer, finding a solution is growing more urgent.