The world that Jalen Brunson resides in, he created it. The expectations. The excitement. Even the spaciousness in which he’ll now be able to maneuver on the court inside the confines of the world’s most famous arena. That’s him, too. It’s all Brunson.
The New York Knicks haven’t spent the last nine months acquiring high-end talent — and, in turn, losing assets and putting themselves in a vulnerable financial situation — simply because they could. The Knicks did it because Brunson is one of the league’s premier talents who, with each passing year, puts to shame anyone who tries to cap who and what he can become. New York didn’t just acquire two 3-and-D wings within the last calendar year. For Brunson, they acquired two of the best in OG Anunoby and Mikal Bridges. The Knicks didn’t just recently acquire any floor-spacing center. For Brunson, they just acquired Karl-Anthony Towns, arguably the greatest shooting big man in the league.
New York got the best role players for one of the brightest stars in the league. What Brunson has done and what history suggests he’ll continue to do has earned such a commitment.
“I haven’t really processed it,” Brunson said at media day on Monday when asked if he’s been able to internalize how the organization has built the team to his strengths. “Yeah, we’ll cross that bridge when we get to it, but I just know that we have a lot of guys who are hungry and willing to do whatever it takes.
“I would never consider myself (a face of the franchise). There are definitely people on the outside who cans say it if they want, but I’m a leader of this team, I want to lead this team and I’m grateful of the opportunity. I don’t take this for granted.”
The most exciting season at the epicenter of basketball is here, and Brunson is the core of it all — even if his humility suggests otherwise. The Knicks are title contenders. Brunson will be a Most Valuable Player candidate. Twenty-plus years of heartache and confusion very well could transform into elation and clarity for a fan base that’s been told to believe this and believe that simply out of loyalty and blind faith.
New York will go as far as Brunson takes it this season, and beyond. Again, this world he lives in was created to his specifications. The Knicks have gone from a scrunch to a spread with their moves. Brunson, more than anyone else, benefits from that. He didn’t ask for all of this. He just proved to be that damn good.
“I knew throughout college, but I really knew when he signed (with the Knicks),” Knicks teammate Mikal Bridges, who played with Brunson at Villanova, said. “I knew what he was going to do, especially in the league we play in. Him having the ball and being able to be ball dominant … his efficiency is out of the roof. I knew what he was going to be able to do with the ball in hands here, more than what he was able to do in Dallas.”
Even with all of that, there seems to still be a lingering notion out there that a Brunson-led team has a ceiling. In theory, those doubters are somewhat correct. However, Brunson’s history suggests that the proverbial “ceiling” is a championship. He’s done it before. Several times, actually. Once as a high school player in suburban Chicago and twice as a focal point to Villanova basketball’s dominance in the late 2010s.
The world Brunson has created today, he started building long ago.
“I think Jalen was looked at from the start as someone who would be one of the better players,” Villanova assistant coach Mike Nardi said. “His talent was so obvious, but everyone doubted his athleticism and ability to defend because he wasn’t as quick. That’s where his intelligence and grit, and wanting to prove to himself — not other people — that he could do certain things. That’s why he is where he is.
“You’re just not going to win that battle if you’re doubting him.”
The worst-kept secret on the recruiting trail in 2014 was that Brunson — a five-star recruit, the top point guard in the country and a McDonald’s All-American out of Stevenson High in Lincolnshire, Ill. — was headed for Villanova.
Early on in the recruiting process, former Michigan head coach John Beilein and his staff were eager to lure Brunson’s services to Ann Arbor. However, as time went on, the whispers about where Brunson wanted to play college ball grew louder, and Beilein, not wanting to waste anyone’s time, lightened up his pursuit and looked elsewhere.
To this day, Beilein still remembers the last time he watched Brunson play in high school.
“I think he scored 49 or 50,” Beilein said. “I always say I want that coach on the floor, the guy who thinks like the coaches think. Jalen, between his dad and coaches in Chicago, embraced basketball IQ. A lot of people don’t do that. Some players might not even know it exists.”
Brunson went to a Villanova program as its most decorated recruit in quite some time. The Wildcats weren’t really known for attracting elite recruits. Instead, under legendary head coach Jay Wright, really good high school players would enter his program and leave as elite college players or legitimate pros. It was a combination of the program Wright had in place and the characteristics of the players he recruited — the majority of whom were gym rats, as well as talented — that allowed them to reach their potential and, in some cases, exceed it. An NBA coach once told me, “I’d draft Villanova players every year if I could.”
Brunson was the best of both worlds. He entered college as an elite talent but with the work ethic of someone who wasn’t content. The season before Brunson’s arrival in the summer of 2015, Villanova finished the season 33-3. Many of those key players returned the following year. Wright never guaranteed Brunson that he would play immediately. Villanova had proven senior guard Ryan Arcidiacono leading the backcourt. Josh Hart was entering his junior season and had established himself. Sophomore Phil Booth played big minutes as a freshman in the NCAA Tournament.
The Wildcats didn’t need Brunson going into the season.
“He worked his tail off to earn the starting spot,” Villanova assistant coach Ashley Howard said. “Jalen came in as the only McDonald’s All-American on our team. … We had a lot of guys in our program before that developed and didn’t come in with a lot of hype. They turned into big-time college players and pros at Villanova. Jalen was aware enough to know, ‘I’m going to come in here and outwork everybody so that no one could say that I’m this superstar, hot-shot freshman being given everything.’ He showed he had a work ethic that was unmatched.”
The talent, the work in practice and the extra shooting and ballhandling after, most of which took place with his father, Rick, who is now an assistant on the Knicks coaching staff, led to the 6-foot-2 guard being a starter from Day 1. As a freshman, Brunson was steady, with high-level performances sprinkled in that sent a reminder to everyone how talented he is. Brunson never did too much. He always tried to fit into the flow of the game, to do what the team needed on a certain night.
“What made him so special is that when he was coming into school as this huge recruit, he was willing and knowing he was coming to a situation where we were a top team and had established players,” said Arcidiacono, Brunson’s roommate on the road. “He came in with the mindset of wanting to know the best way he could contribute and help himself get better to prepare himself for the seasons after.
“He was always able to see the bigger picture in every situation he’s been in.”
Brunson’s first college season ended with a championship. His last college season ended with a championship. That final year, which was Brunson’s junior season, he was the alpha. Brunson averaged nearly 20 points per game. He was voted the best player in college basketball. It felt like every other 3-pointer he put up, went in. It felt like every pass he made had purpose.
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The natural talent, along with the work behind the scenes, culminated in one of the best individual seasons in Villanova history. And like Arcidiacono before him, Brunson was putting guys under his wing. If you wondered where Donte DiVincenzo was after practice, just find Brunson. Those within an already-established program took on the qualities of its on-court leader.
“Jalen really wanted to be a pro, and that rubbed off on Donte,” Nardi said.
If you ask Beilein, who coached collegiately for over 30 years when Brunson’s Villanova team beat his Wolverines in the 2018 championship game, that particular Wildcats squad, which was primarily made up of freshmen, sophomores and juniors, was as good of a team as he can recall in recent seasons.
“You have to go back to the times when teams were primarily made up of juniors and seniors to find a team that was that good,” Beilein said. “They beat Kansas by 16 before us! It was a joke. They were so efficient.”
Greatness hasn’t just followed Brunson. He’s been associated with it. Chicago is one of the best areas for high school basketball in the country, and Brunson left his mark there. He won in college not once, but twice, and is one of the more memorable players from a program with a pack of them.
Why would the NBA be any different? And what better place than New York to get it done?
“He’s always just been focused and driven, and there’s nothing wrong with that,” former college teammate Kris Jenkins said. “His personality, focus, dedication, he has an energy that you want to be around. He sacrifices and is selfless. When I first met him, he was such a serious young guy. That was something I hadn’t really seen before, with someone being that young.
In the summer of 2022, on the heels of Brunson’s tremendous postseason with the Dallas Mavericks, one that really made the NBA world pay closer attention to the former college star, Dwayne Anderson had a conversation with Brunson that foretold where we are today.
At the time, Brunson was a free agent and coming off a campaign in which he was a first-time starter and pivotal to the Dallas Mavericks reaching the Western Conference finals. The Knicks had recently hired his father, Rick, to the coaching staff, furthering its not-so-subtle pursuit of the guard that began during the regular season. The NBA world was anticipating Brunson going to the Knicks, and many were unsure if he was good enough to lead a franchise, let alone that franchise, which had gone 20-plus years with various dysfunction and has a fan base that’ll let you hear it if they feel it necessary.
Anderson, a former Villanova basketball player and current assistant coach, said Brunson had it all mapped out.
“He talked about possibly going to a team in the East, becoming an All-Star and building something special,” Anderson said. “It wasn’t an arrogance thing. It’s because he trusts the work that he put in. He spoke it into existence.”
Brunson undersold himself a bit. He quickly quieted any critic who thought he couldn’t be a franchise player or was the product of nepotism. His first season as a Knick, Brunson averaged career-highs in points (24), assists (6.2), 3-point percentage (41.6 percent) and many more categories, all while having a career-high 27.2 percent usage. He was a top-12 MVP candidate and top-three Most Improved Player candidate. New York won more than 45 games for the first time in 10 years. Yet, somehow Brunson didn’t make the All-Star team.
No worries.
This past season, Brunson averaged 28.7 points and 6.7 assists while shooting 40.1 percent from 3 with his usage boosted to 32.5 percent. He wasn’t only named an All-Star for the first time, but also was voted a top-five MVP candidate, earned All-NBA honors and led the Knicks to their first 50-win season since 2012-13.
This is where Brunson is today. A player who continues to get better every season is now playing in the most conducive situation to his skill set he’s ever had. People should be afraid of that. Brunson has already won over the New York faithful and is a championship away from the possibility of a statue the same size of the green lady in the New York Harbor. The Knicks are in this position because of Brunson and his lifelong mission to not prove others wrong, but prove himself right.
Everything that’s happening now in New York is a product of Brunson becoming the player that everyone who knows him one day envisioned, and the player many who barely know him didn’t think he could become.
He’s not doing this alone, though, nor would he want anyone to think otherwise. He was born out of a premier program and understands the importance of everyone coming together for a common goal. Brunson, though, is the reason all the stars are aligning at this moment in time.
This is his world.
“Jalen Brunson doesn’t want to take credit for leading them to the playoffs,” Nardi said. “He wants this to be a collective group thing. Those guys enjoy being part of a team and doing it together. That’s why I think they are where they are.
“These guys have proven that they belong. They’re going to do whatever it takes to win. Everyone individually has goals, but if your team wins and you do things together, it’s going to give you the best chance at getting your individual awards. That is what is ingrained in them, and that’s what I think is happening in New York.”
(Top photo of Jalen Brunson: Dylan Buell / Getty Images)
