BOSTON — The hobbling Knicks arrived here Saturday to a snowy city, where the locals were gearing up for their big Drake Maye Day and Jaylen Brown had his sights set on the opponent he enjoys beating the most.
“We just got to keep it up,” Brown said after the Celtics toppled the Heat on Friday night. “Sunday is going to be a big matchup so we need the fans to have the same energy.
“Looking forward to it.”
For the Beantowners, it’s a pre-Super Bowl showdown against the Knicks, who eliminated the Celtics from the playoffs last year and are now among a handful of teams jockeying at the top of the East.
The Knicks (33-19), whose eight-game winning streak was embarrassingly snapped Friday night in a blowout defeat to the Pistons, are third in the conference and a full game behind the No. 2 Celtics (34-18).
New York is banged up — with Miles McBride out for the regular season (sports hernia surgery), OG Anunoby (sore toe) and Karl-Anthony Towns (lacerated eyelid) sitting the previous game and Josh Hart reinjuring his ankle — but Jose Alvarado, the newly acquired scrappy point guard, is expected to debut for the orange and blue.
“He just brings a level of toughness to the team, his energy is unmatched,” Knicks coach Mike Brown said. “What he can do defensively in the full court and even in the frontcourt on the ball, especially on pick-and-rolls and stuff like that, is at a pretty high level.”
The Celtics also have a newcomer — the skilled but athletically limited Nikola Vucevic — who they got from the Bulls ahead of the trade deadline.
But Boston’s success this season — which is a surprise given Jayson Tatum’s absence following Achilles surgery — rides on the shoulders of Brown, who has made it known how he feels about the Knicks.
“Last year [in 2024] we were a championship team,” Brown said in a Netflix show ahead of this season. “We won the championship … Duckboats, champagne. … This year we gotta listen to insufferable Knicks fans. I don’t know how we lost in general.”
In December, Brown was more blunt: “F–k the Knicks,” he said on a livestream, a few weeks after dropping 42 points in a victory over New York at TD Garden.
Sunday is the latest installment of the rivalry and occurs with New York looking up at Boston in the standings.
The Knicks had been impressive for weeks before their ugly effort Friday in Detroit, where they managed a season-low 80 points and were overwhelmed by the Pistons speed and physicality.
“We missed a lot of shots offensively,” reserve guard Jordan Clarkson said. “They pressured us. We were just taking tough shots throughout the whole game. So, they got out and scored easy transition points and stuff like that. So, it’s definitely tough to beat a team on their own court when stuff like that is happening.”
The Celtics, who have won five straight, are theoretically a better matchup than the Pistons for the Knicks, who won’t win a footrace but can handle size.
The teams split the first two matchups of this season.
And if the current standings hold up, the Knicks would again meet the Celtics in the second round.
That’s an opportunity Brown — who is averaging 29.5 points this season — has been waiting for.
But first: a Super Bowl undercard at TD Garden.