The Knicks’ new guys will get their first regular-season taste of playing at the Garden as home players Friday night against the Pacers.
For those returning, it will mark the first game that counts at MSG — and their first crack at Indiana — since the Knicks were knocked out of the playoffs in Game 7 of the second round last spring.
“A big challenge,” Jalen Brunson said after practice Thursday. “It’s a team we lost to last year. I mean, they have our number. So we’ve just got to be ready to go.”
Brunson suffered a broken left hand during the Knicks’ Game 7 loss to the Pacers in May, adding one more to a slew of injuries they had to deal with before and after dropping that second-round series.
Mitchell Robinson and since-traded Julius Randle already were sidelined for the Knicks.
OG Anunoby also lasted only five minutes while trying to come back from a hamstring injury in Game 7, and Josh Hart played but was hampered by a back issue suffered earlier in the series.
Brunson departed the decisive game in the second half, before Tyrese Haliburton and the Pacers went on to swipe a 130-109 win prior to falling to the Celtics in the Eastern Conference Finals.
“A lot of people said that we were getting blown out. But I remember in the second half we were making a little run,” Brunson said. “And then obviously I broke my hand and the game ended, losing by double digits.
“You can always say ‘what if,’ but they won and we’ve got to live with that. We’ve got to move forward.”
Led by 20 points from center Myles Turner, Indiana won its season opener Wednesday night on the road against the Pistons.
Meanwhile, the Knicks were routed in their first game with offseason acquisitions Karl-Anthony Towns and Mikal Bridges in Boston.
Entering his third season in New York — and named captain in the offseason — Brunson said of the home opener that it’s “very special to play in front of the home fans in this arena and everything New York has to offer.”
“It’s been unbelievable every single time,” he added. “So I don’t take things for granted whatsoever.”