Jack steadily plies trade
The same words are used about Jarrett Jack day in, day out, game after game. Leader. He gets the Knicks in the right spots from his point guard position. Mentor. He is helping rookie Frank Ntilikina navigate the NBA minefield. Professional. Veteran. You’ve heard them.
But Monday night at several points in the Knicks’ 107-85 victory over the woeful Clippers, Jack had to be much more. He had to be a real take-charge guy, a scorer. And so that’s what he did. “For sure. I’ve been known in this league as an offensive guy, a guy who can come in and score quickly, but when I was thrust into this lineup, there were already a couple of guys who had it going offensively,” said Jack, pointing to Kristaps Porzingis, Enes Kanter, Courtney Lee and Tim Hardaway Jr.
“So there might have been too many chefs in the kitchen if I had showed up getting my stuff off too. Somebody’s got to kind of sacrifice in a sense for the betterment of it,” Jack said.
So he has sacrificed. But those moments do arise. Like in the second quarter. The Clippers had just gone up by eight points. Jack orchestrated a 10-0 run. After a Doug McDermott 3, Jack hit a three-point play and then promptly assisted Porzingis and Hardaway for scores. So he had a direct hand in seven of the 10 points.
“I thought Jarrett was great,” coach Jeff Hornacek said. “He really controlled things, he got us off to a good start. … He played a great game.”
In all ways. Jack ended with 11 points, seven assists and a steal. In the third quarter, after the Clippers had cut a 15-point deficit to two, Jack went to work again. He assisted a McDermott 3, grabbed a defensive rebound and Porzingis ended up hitting two free throws. He assisted a Kanter score, another McDermott 3 and by the time he exited at 4:11, the Knicks were back up 13.
“When I see moments where I need to be aggressive and make things happen offensively, that’s not out of my wheelhouse at all,” Jack said. “And for those moments, I just felt I could make some plays, try to do what I thought the defense gave me and luckily I was able to knock them down.”