Steve Popper: Knicks' Jalen Brunson vs. Hawks' Dyson Daniels is key matchup in first-round playoff series

GREENBURGH — It’s not something new to find defensive-minded players who believe they can be the stopper against an elite offensive player. There were those who believed they could be Michael Jordan stoppers or Kobe Bryant stoppers. And there are those who look at Jalen Brunson’s 6-2 frame and his under-the-rim skill set and believe they can stop him, too.

The Pistons’ Ausar Thompson is one of the best young defensive players in the game, but his defining moment right now is sliding across the floor helplessly as Brunson crossed him over and drained a series-winning three-point field goal in the closing seconds of a first-round playoff series last season.

And as the Knicks and Atlanta Hawks prepare for their opening-round series, this time it is Dyson Daniels who believes.

He’s said as much, quoted in a story on hawks.com last season saying, “I know when I’m out there, he’s trying to foul me out. He doesn’t want me guarding him, that’s for sure.”

Brunson struggled in his first two games against Atlanta in the 2024-25 regular season. Then on Jan. 20, he took the challenge personally, converting 12 of 18 shots, scoring 34 points and, most notably, doing the sort of thing he rarely has been spotted doing — answering back.

When Daniels fouled out, Brunson raised six fingers and counted the fouls, sending Daniels to the bench.

This season, like last, Daniels has spent more time than any other Hawks defender guarding Brunson. And the results, well, haven’t been great for him.

Two weeks after that 34-point effort last season, Brunson scored 36 points and shot 13-for-21 — including an ice-water-in-his-veins game-winning shot in overtime over Daniels.

This season Brunson averaged 29.3 points per game against Atlanta, including a 30-point, 13-assist performance on April 6 in the most recent meeting, which included 17 points in the final 6:13.

One lesson is that no one defender — and the Hawks have multiple players to throw at Brunson — stops a great offensive player. And the other lesson is that if you think you have Brunson figured out, he is figuring you out at the same time, and he’s better at it than you are.

“He watches his shots,” Josh Hart said. “He sees what kind of angles he can try to use or exploit. For me, I try to screen a little bit differently depending on who’s guarding him, if it’s Dyson Daniels or, I don’t know, Nickeil [Alexander-Walker] or whoever it is.

“So you always try to learn from your opponent, and I think that’s something that he tries to do every time he comes to the bench, watch his film, talks to his coaches and stuff like that. So, you know, I think he does a good job in the course of the game of reading the game and letting the game tell them what to do.”

“Jalen, he’s seen it all, and he’s very smart, very cerebral,” Knicks coach Mike Brown said. “So he takes it all in, and he’ll have plenty of counters to a lot of different defenses on his own.

“But in the same breath, we have to, as a staff, make sure we continue moving him around because we don’t want to give them the same dose the entire game. If you give a team the same dose the entire game, then they can sit on the coverage and get more comfortable with it as the game goes along. It’s a combination of us helping him and him helping himself.”

Daniels is an elite defensive player who led the NBA in steals last season (3.0 per game) and finished second this season. He was a first-team All-Defensive Team member last season and finished second in balloting for Defensive Player of the Year. And despite the rivalry, Brunson speaks highly — at least publicly, if not on the court — of him.

“Yeah, he’s a great defender,” Brunson said. “He’s very smart and he is great. He’s able to use his wingspan and create havoc on and off the ball. He does a lot of great things for their team and he puts them in position to be successful.”

Daniels will get help guarding Brunson, whether it’s Alexander-Walker or CJ McCollum. And Brunson will need help, too, whether it’s Karl-Anthony Towns taking advantage of the size edge he has against the Hawks’ big men or even Hart hitting the open shots he gets as the defenses try to focus on the Knicks’ top two scorers.

Brunson won’t praise his own play other than to say that his confidence “comes from my work ethic, and that hasn’t changed since I guess I’ve been dribbling a basketball.” But he — and the Knicks — have gotten better and seemed to fit together better as the season has worn on.

“I have a lot of confidence in us. A lot,” Brunson said. “To be honest, there’s a lot of things that go on that you guys don’t see, a lot of things that we talk about, a lot of things that we do that we don’t even say publicly and for a reason, because we want to keep everything in house . . . like I said, I have the utmost confidence in them.”

And they have it in him.

By Steve Popper

steve.popper@newsday.com@StevePopper

Steve Popper covers the Knicks for Newsday. He has spent nearly three decades covering the Knicks and the NBA, along with just about every sports team in the New York metropolitan area.