Hours before tipoff at Madison Square Garden on Monday, Jalen Suggs set the tone.
One of four key Orlando Magic rotation players sidelined by injury, Suggs sent his head coach a text message that quickly became a rallying cry for the team.
“We knew that we were 0-3 against the New York Knicks,” said Jamahl Mosley, the reigning Coach of the Year runner-up. “So there’s something that we need to do in order to change this mentality.”
The depleted Magic answered the challenge, avoiding a season-series sweep with a 103-94 victory at Madison Square Garden.
The loss marked the Knicks’ third straight defeat, exposing the fragility of their already short rotation — a weakness magnified by the wear and tear accumulated during their impressive run.
During the Knicks’ nine-game winning streak and a dominant stretch of 19 wins in 23 games, the heavy burden on their core players began to take its toll. A string of recent injuries have exacerbated the workload facing New York’s starting five.
Mitchell Robinson was already expected to be out until around February recovering from his second procedure to repair a stress fracture in his left ankle.
Miles McBride (hamstring) and Karl-Anthony Towns (right knee) as late scratches further stretched a light Knicks bench even more thin.
Yet unlike the Magic — who were missing Suggs, All-Star Paolo Banchero, breakout star Franz Wagner, sixth man Mo Wagner, and veteran guard Gary Harris — the Knicks opted against expanding their rotation to include younger players at the end of the bench.
Because the Knicks traded away the players from recent draft classes they drafted and developed to go all-in on contention, and because they did not have the salary cap flexibility to sign players making more than the veteran’s minimum, the end of then New York bench is composed of players who do not get minutes.
Not even under duress.
And this has become the Achilles heel of a team attempting to position itself for a title run: When fully healthy, the Knicks are a dynamic offensive force capable of outpacing even elite NBA defenses.
But against gritty, physical defense, New York’s lack of dependable depth beyond the top six or seven players — and the injuries amplifying this vulnerability — have exposed a blueprint to opponent victory.
After Orlando’s victory on Monday, two key Magic players told the Daily News they predicted the Knicks’ rotation would not stretch irregularly deep into the bench even with injuries mounting.
“We kind of already know Thibs is one of them coaches that plays his players until the buzzer ends,” 12-year veteran Kentavious Caldwell-Pope told The News. “We kind of know that from previous coaching, other teams, stuff like that.”
“Those dudes play super hard,” added Orlando’s defensive irritant Anthony Black. “Honestly, they play a lot of minutes. Yeah, other teams know that, of course.”
Perhaps this was the message Suggs passed along to his teammates. After all, he’s a shark, and sharks can smell blood in the water.
In this case, the “blood” was the fatigue creeping into a Knicks starting unit that’s been grinding through heavy mileage, showing wear with every passing game.
Asked if the Knicks are, indeed, fatigued, Thibodeau attributed their slump to “a compilation of a lot of things.”
“We’re coming off a long road trip,” he said. “But that’s the challenge of the league. Be ready every night, We’re shorthanded. When you’re shorthanded, you’ve got to play hard. Your margin of error is tight.”
The minutes, of course, never lie. Mikal Bridges and Josh Hart lead the NBA in time on the floor, and OG Anunoby isn’t far behind, ranking in the top seven. Towns normally logs heavy minutes, too, though he frequently finds himself on the bench due to foul trouble.
Even with Landry Shamet and Cam Payne providing some relief for Jalen Brunson, the Knicks’ star guard continues to endure a punishing workload. Already managing tightness in his right calf, Brunson took a hard poke to the eye, was the subject of aggressive Magic defensive coverages, and hit the floor repeatedly on drives to the rim on Monday.
His night ended in frustration as he fouled out with just over a minute remaining in regulation. Hart, similarly, took a hard hit to the head on a second-quarter drive to the rim.
After the starting five of Towns, Anunoby, Bridges, Hart and Brunson, Thibodeau turns to Shamet, McBride, Payne and Precious Achiuwa. Jericho Sims, largely outside the rotation, has been situational, though he got the start for the injured Towns and finished with 4 points, 10 rebounds, 2 assists, and a block.
Those behind Sims on the roster typically do not see the floor.
The Knicks selected Pacome Dadiet with the 25th overall pick in the June NBA Draft, but he has spent most of his time in the G-League. So has 34th overall pick Tyler Kolek, who Thibodeau did not subject to the overwhelming Orlando defense on Monday. The Knicks also called 58th and final pick Ariel Hukporti up from the G-League once there was some concern Towns would not be able to play on Monday.
He, too, looked on from the bench.
Black and Caldwell-Pope predicted Thibodeau’s lineups would not change. The blueprint for success against these reeling Knicks is clear.
They rely heavily on their starters and don’t stretch far into the rotation. If you’re willing to use 10 or more players, and if you’re willing to do the dirty work on defense, you can wear the Knicks down in the first half, then run them out of the building in the second.
“Playing 48 minutes, you’re getting screened, you’re getting hit. We’re pushing the pace, all those are factors, and once we see you get tired, we’ve done our job. Now it’s time for us to get [the offense] going,” Caldwell-Pope told The News. “We’re one of the most well-conditioned teams in the league. We thrive on that. This was a back-to-back for us, and no one looked tired.”
It’s happened in each of the Knicks’ last three games. New York has lost the last three second halves by a 189-138 margin.
Help could be on the way. The starters desperately need the assistance.
Robinson, however, is not walking through that door. He has yet to resume full-speed running, nor has he been cleared to take contact or participate in practice. His return is not believed to be imminent, though Thibodeau said the seven-foot center will return to practice at some point in January.
Thibodeau also said McBride and Towns were close to playing before they decided to sit against the Magic on Monday. He deemed both day-to-day, leaving open the possibility of the two key contributors returning to the lineup for Wednesday’s matchup against the Toronto Raptors.
Sims may have played himself back into the rotation, albeit in defeat, on Monday.
He has recorded a DNP — coach’s decision designation — in six of the team’s last 15 games and has logged six or fewer minutes in seven of his last 10 appearances. Sims’ return to normal minutes would expand the rotation to nine and provide valuable front-court size and depth.
Yet even if McBride and Towns return to the rotation on Wednesday, and even if Sims is back in Thibodeau’s good graces, a concerning roster issue is clear.
With the roster as currently constructed, the Knicks remain one injury away from crisis and two away from the brink of collapse.
The Magic cannot say the same.
Short four of its best players, No. 4 Orlando (22-16) is only 2.5 games behind No. 3 New York (24-13).
The Magic can muck the game up, and they can keep fresh legs on the court at all times. The Knicks can’t, and opponents know it.
“We’ve got a lot of young guys, honestly. We’ve got a lot of fresh legs,” Black told The News as a teammate doubled-down on his statement with an emphatic, expletive-laden co-sign while exiting the locker room. “We’ve got a lot of guys we can swap in. Everybody plays defense the same. Everybody’s buying into the scheme, and we’ve got a good game plan. So we just try to execute that and play hard.”
“Coach Mose always tells us, ‘Play til you get tired, then raise your hand,’ and we did that tonight,” Caldwell-Pope told The News. “We’re subbing guys in and out. We play until we get tired. That’s one of our key game plans.”