Game 2 tips at 7:35 PM CT from the Frost Bank Center, and Pinnacle has the Spurs back as 6.5-point home favorites with a total of 214.5. Same number as Game 1, more or less. The market is basically telling you it thinks Wednesday was a Spurs game that got away, not a Knicks team that's a level up.
About that Spurs game that got away: San Antonio was up 14 in the third quarter and got outscored 11-0 to close it. Victor Wembanyama went for 26 and 12 but needed 21 shots to do it, and the Knicks figured out by the fourth quarter that if you make him a jump shooter you can live with the result. Stephon Castle (17), Dylan Harper (16), and Julian Champagnie (16) all chipped in, which is the version of the supporting cast San Antonio needs every night. The problem is they got all of that and still lost at home.
The Knicks are riding a 12-game playoff winning streak — the third team in NBA history to do that in a single postseason — and Jalen Brunson is the reason. He dropped 13 of his 30 in the fourth quarter on Wednesday and sealed it with a spinning fall-away while getting knocked to the floor with 38 seconds left. Karl-Anthony Towns added an 18-and-12, OG Anunoby chipped in 17, and the Knicks have now stolen home-court advantage in a series most people thought favored San Antonio.
San Antonio doesn't have a ton of margin on the injury front either. Forward David Jones Garcia is done for the year after ankle surgery back in February, so the depth chart is what it is.
- OutDavid Jones Garcia (F) — Jones Garcia underwent ankle surgery Wednesday and will miss the remainder of the 2025-26 season, Tom Orsborn of the San Antonio Express-News reports.02/04
The other thing hanging over this one is fatigue. The Spurs went 7 games with Oklahoma City in the West Finals and only finished that series on May 30. The Knicks closed out their conference series earlier and have looked fresher in the half-court. If San Antonio is dragging in a Game 2 they have to win, that's where it'll show up — late third, early fourth, exactly where Game 1 turned.
Take Wembanyama at the rim away and force him into 21 contested looks again and the Knicks will probably win again. Get him 12 paint touches early, get Castle and Harper downhill, and the home team covers comfortably. It's that binary. Down 0-2 going to Madison Square Garden is not a place the Spurs want to find out who they are.