NEW YORK — This wasn’t a loss. This was a giveaway.
Gift-wrapped. Ribbon on top. Left on the front porch for the Hawks to take back to Atlanta.
The Knicks blew Game 2 Monday night at Madison Square Garden, 107-106, and in the process managed to turn what should have been a comfortable stroll toward a 2-0 series lead into a loud, ugly reminder that this team still has a bad habit of playing with its food.
And now the series is tied.
Against this Hawks team.
A young, unproven, barely-seasoned bunch that made only nine 3-pointers, clanked enough free throws to lose twice, and still walked out of the Garden looking like the steadier team when it mattered.
So here is the question the Knicks earned all by themselves:
Where is the killer instinct?
Seriously, where is it?
Because teams with real ambitions, teams that are supposed to be talking about the Eastern Conference finals, do not lose this kind of game at home. Not when they lead the whole second half. Not when they are up 12 after three quarters. Not when the other team is helping them with missed foul shots and shaky outside shooting. Not when the building is ready to explode and the opponent is young enough to still be checking IDs at the door.
And yet the Knicks still found a way to gag it up.
That takes work.
Jalen Brunson scored 29. Fine. Karl-Anthony Towns woke up long enough to score 14 points in the third quarter and finish with 18. Josh Hart did his usual impersonation of the only guy on the floor who seems offended by losing, with 15 points, 13 rebounds and six assists.
And none of it was enough, because when the game got tight, the Knicks got soft.
Meanwhile, CJ McCollum — the newest Madison Square Garden villain — walked into the fourth quarter and started treating the Knicks like they were extras in his personal highlight reel. He scored 32, hit the biggest shots of the night, and played like the only adult in the gym once the pressure showed up. Every time the Knicks had a chance to slam the door, McCollum kicked it back open and then took the hinges off.
And the worst part? He even tried to hand it back.
McCollum missed two free throws with 5.6 seconds left. Two. Free. Throws.
That should have been the basketball equivalent of a pardon.
Instead the Knicks came flying up the floor in a panic, with no timeout, no composure, and no finish. Mikal Bridges missed the jumper at the buzzer, and that was that. Ballgame. Boos. Stunned Garden. Series tied.
This is the problem with the Knicks. They want credit for being tough before they consistently do tough-team things. They want to be treated like a team on the rise, a team ready for the conference elite, a team built for May and June. Fine. Then act like it.
Because what happened Monday night was not some heroic Atlanta ambush. The Hawks didn’t come in here looking unbeatable. They looked beatable for most of the night. Very beatable. The Knicks just refused to finish the job. They let a young team hang around, let it breathe, let it believe, and then looked shocked when it started throwing punches back.
Now the scene shifts to Atlanta, where those same young Hawks are going to be looser, louder and more comfortable. And if they start making more threes there? If they stop leaving points at the foul line? If the role players get a little swagger at home?
Then what?
Because if the Knicks couldn’t bury them in the Garden while Atlanta was busy leaving the back door open, what exactly are they planning to do on the road?
This was supposed to be the easy part. This was supposed to be the appetizer. The setup. The warm-up act before bigger names and bigger stakes.
Instead the Knicks turned it into a warning label.
Maybe they still win the series. Maybe they go down to Atlanta and reassert themselves. Maybe this winds up as the kind of playoff stumble nobody remembers in two weeks.
But right now?
Right now this looks less like a contender taking command and more like a team that still doesn’t understand that playoff games are not won by vibes, headlines or home-court introductions.
They are won by ending people.
The Knicks had the Hawks on the table Monday night and couldn’t finish the cut.
That is why this one should sting.
Not because they lost.
Because they choked.
