The fans in attendance, most notably Spike Lee, that stayed til the mercy cry of the buzzer had booed their lungs out at the young team, who'd already been yelled at all game long by Coach Thibodeau. He got ejected to make matters worse when Draymond Green got whistled for a flagrant-1 foul on Brandon Ingram, who nearly annihilated the Knicks by himself.
The Slender-Man scored 32 points with 4 steals, leading the Spurs. Andre Drummond crushed the Knicks in the 4th Quarter, finishing with 20 points & 23 rebounds with 5 thunderous blocks & 3 steals. Dejounte Murray had 19 points & 7 assists. Fred VanVleet was a flawless five-for-five from long range, scoring 19 points & 12 assists in his best game so far this season. KCP chipped in 15 points. Evan Fournier had 10 points, with 8 points by Alex Caruso.
For the Knicks, it wasn't all bad, somehow: Mitchell Robinson had 18 points. R.J. Barrett had 16 points, but shot 6-14. Nerlens Noel had 14 points in the loss. The Spurs shot an astounding 60%, to 38% by NY. They also shot 57% from 3PT territory, to just 10% by the Knicks (2-20!). They won the fast break, 39-19, dominated the paint 74-56, had 44 assists as a team which may very well be close to a team record and dominated the glass 53-38. The Knicks were forced into 18 turnovers and never led.
It's still early this season, but the Spurs may have trouble scoring 143 points a second time. For comparison, the 76ers scored 143 points against the Spurs two seasons ago, when they lost the Finals in double overtime. San Antonio also scored 145 points in the regular season that year in a huge win over the Timberwolves. The team record for points by the Spurs is 171, way back in 1982 which was a triple-overtime win over the Bucks.