NBA: Knicks roll over Celtics to reach Eastern finals

Jalen Brunson and OG Anunoby each scored 23 points for the Knicks, who will face the Indiana Pacers, the same team they met in their last conference finals appearance in 2000. Game 1 is Wednesday night in New York.

The Knicks hadn’t won a playoff series on their home floor since the 1999 East finals. So the celebration started late in the one-sided first half inside Madison Square Garden and was sure to carry on deep into the night around the arena.

Mikal Bridges scored 22 points and Karl-Anthony Towns had 21 for the Knicks, whose 38-point margin of victory was their largest in a postseason game.

Jaylen Brown scored 20 points for the Celtics, who lost leading scorer Jayson Tatum to a ruptured Achilles tendon in Game 4 but believed they still had enough to get it back to Boston for Game 7 and keep their title defence alive.

It was quickly clear that wasn’t happening.

The Celtics led by at least 14 in each of the first five games, but this time the Knicks started fast and kept pouring it on until Boston coach Joe Mazzulla began pulling his starters in the third quarter after the deficit reached 41 points.

The Knicks scored the first seven points of the second quarter to make it 33-20. New York blew it open with a 13-3 run that made it 49-27, a surge highlighted by 6-foot-1 guard Deuce McBride’s chasedown block of Derrick White’s shot that led to Josh Hart’s second straight basket while being fouled.