Josh Hart’s three-pointer is no longer broken.
Hart is shooting 39.2% from three-point range since the mid-February NBA All-Star Break.
He was shooting just 30.6% from downtown prior to the break and even went on his own Roommates Podcast with Jalen Brunson to declare his jumper “broke.”
Hart said he hit the lab and fixed his struggling three-ball with reps and slight tinkering of his shot.
He said he worked tirelessly through the All-Star break to improve a previously reliable jump shot back to its old form.
“Just continuing to work on it. I think this was the first All-Star [break] that I — normally I let my body rest, All-Star, don’t do anything. This one I was in the gym every day, trying to get back to the basics. Then when I go out there, not think and shoot with confidence. If teams are going to play off of me, I’ve got to be confident to take and make shots.”
Hart said shooting is about repetition and confidence but noted he made some slight adjustments to his shooting form.
“Tried to tweak some stuff, keep the elbow in,” he said. “Try to get the ball off my palm as much as I can.”
Hart shot 51.9% from three-point range after arriving in New York in a mid-season trade last season. The most frustrating part of his shooting skid, he said, was the impact it had on the Knicks offense.
“You do that [miss open shots], you make it a little tougher offensively because you’re not making shots,” he said. “Teams are playing off and it doesn’t give guys like J.B. [Jalen Brunson], Ju [Julius Randle], Te [Donte DiVincenzo], now AB [Alec Burks] and OG [Anunoby], lanes to cut and drive.
“That’s the frustrating thing. Feels more so like you’re letting the team down.”
Head coach Tom Thibodeau said he knew Hart’s jumper would come around because of the amount of time he put into working on his shot.
“He’s put a lot of work. I say it to all our guys,” he said. “I see what you do before practice, in practice then after practice, and as long as you’re working on your shots, if you’re open, I want you to let it go.”
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Thibodeau said Alec Burks’ struggling shooting numbers don’t paint a full picture.
Instead, Thibodeau points to Burks’ net rating to justify playing the veteran wing impactful minutes despite a faltering jumper.
Burks shot two-of-six from the field for five points in 11 minutes in Thursday’s 11-point loss to the Golden State Warriors.
He is shooting 24-of-66, or 36.3%, from the field and 12-of-37 (32.4%) from downtown through the eight games he’s played since arriving in New York alongside Bojan Bogdanovic as part of the Quentin Grimes trade with the Detroit Pistons.
Thibodeau said he likes the shots Burks is getting in the offense.
“But if you look at his net rating — and again tonight, I probably should have played him more minutes tonight — he’s a plus when he’s on the floor, good things are happening. So just keep working.”
What exactly is Burks doing that doesn’t show up on the box score?
“I think the one thing is it does give you spacing because people know that he can shoot. And that is very good in a pick and roll game,” Thibodeau continued. “And so it gives you a second pick and roll player on the floor. Sometimes we all tend to measure on what a guy shoots, but there’s other things that he’s bringing and just being on the floor to create space. Sometimes that’s what you need is the space.
“When you get that, now Jalen can drive to the basket or Deuce can drive to the basket. So that’s why we liked him. We know he’s gonna shoot threes at a pretty high clip. And so I think if you sometimes if you tend to look at it in a game or two, you’re not gonna get the true picture. And we just talked about that like [Stephen] Curry just went through a stretch where he wasn’t making, but he’s arguably the best shooter ever. It’s part of the game.
“So you deal with missed shots as long as you’re working on your shot, you live with that.”
Burks was plus-six against the Warriors on Thursday.
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Isaiah Hartenstein said he returned early from a sore left Achilles to help a depleted Knicks team stay afloat in its fight to retain playoff standing.
“I probably could’ve sat out a couple more weeks,” he said. “But to me, I think we found a perfect medium where we’re ramping it up at a good time. Just want to be here for the team.”
Hartenstein has been on a minutes restriction ever since missing a second string of games due to left Achilles tendinopathy.
He did not play in Tuesday’s second leg of a back-to-back against the New Orleans Pelicans and logged just 20 minutes on Thursday against the Warriors as part of a ramp-up process.
“I feel it [the Achilles] now a little bit,” he said after the game on Thursday. “But that’s why you ramp it up because it will get better and better. That’s where we’re at. We don’t want to spike it up too much at this point. We have a good program in place. It’ll get better. That’s the good thing about it.”
