Burks, Barrett lead Knicks past Pistons
DETROIT — Alec Burks hit a 3-pointer for New York’s final points and finished off Detroit with a last-second steal in the Knicks’ 104-102 victory over the Pistons on Sunday.
R.J. Barrett led New York with 21 points, Julian Randle had 20 and Burks and Immanuel Quickly had 18 each.
Trailing by two, the Pistons called a timeout to set up a final play with 6.6 seconds left. Killian Hayes inbounded the ball to Cade Cunningham, but Burks stripped the ball as he tried to drive.
Marvin Bagley III led Detroit with 27 points, and Cunningham added 18.
CELTICS 134, TIMBERWOLVES 112
BOSTON — Jayson Tatum scored 34 points and Jaylen Brown had 31 points and 10 rebounds on Sunday night to help the Celtics coast to their sixth straight win.
The Celtics won for the 24th time in their last 28 games and, combined with the 76ers loss to Phoenix a few minutes later, took over the top spot in the Eastern Conference standings for the first time this season.
This win came at the expense of the team that until recently had been the one of the hottest in the NBA: Minnesota is 12-5 since the All-Star break, winning 10 of 11 before back-to-back losses to Phoenix and Dallas this week.
Anthony Edwards scored 24 and Karl-Anthony Towns added 19 as the Timberwolves opened a four-game trip with a loss — their third in four games.
The Celtics scored 13 of the first 15 points in the second quarter to open a double-digit lead they never relinquished. It was 72-49 at halftime.
By that point, the only question was whether Tatum would move into the NBA lead in scoring. He did, finishing the day with 1,923 points to pass Atlanta’s Trae Young (1,915) for the top spot.
The Celtics star already has one of the top 15 scoring seasons in Celtics history and has seven games left to become the seventh player in franchise history to top 2,000 points in a season. He would join John Havlicek, Paul Pierce, Larry Bird, Isaiah Thomas, Kevin McHale, Sam Jones.