For the first time since 2013, the New York Knicks find themselves in the postseason. To say Madison Square Garden was amped up on Sunday would be an understatement -- the crowd’s energy could've easily been mistaken for a rock concert. And that reached a crescendo when Knicks fans jumped out of their seats after former league MVP Derrick Rose hit a clutch floater with 10.2 seconds remaining in the fourth quarter.
Overtime seemed inevitable, as did the Knicks winning with help from the Garden's tremendous crowd. But what happened next? Trae Young.
It wasn't Rose’s floater, but rather Young’s with less than a second left that proved to be the game-winning bucket for the Atlanta Hawks in Game 1 of the first-round series. Sunday's best player wasn’t MVP candidate Julius Randle or Rose. It was the 22-year-old Young, who poured in 32 points, dished out 10 assists, and grabbed seven boards in his first career playoff game. In NBA postseason history, only four other players age 22 or younger have accomplished that feat: LeBron James, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Luka Doncic, and Tracy McGrady. You might've heard of them. It’s also worth mentioning that at 6-foot-1, Young recorded the second-most rebounds against a very scrappy Knicks team. Should we be surprised by the historical greatness of Young in his first career playoff game? Absolutely not.
Young was the only player this season to average over 25 points per game and nine assists, and he and Hall of Famer Oscar Robertson are the only players to accomplish the feat at age 22 or younger. By any account or narrative, that's one heck of a season. Off the play and will of Young, the Hawks earned the fifth seed in the East. Do you want to know the most bizarre part of all this? Young wasn’t even selected as an All-Star this season. Disrespected much? Yes, indeed.
There were 27 players selected for the 2021 All-Star game, and somehow, Young wasn't included with them. What might be equally bizarre is the fact that Young was an All-Star starter last season, while his Hawks won less than 30-percent of their games. This season, Atlanta won 57-percent of its games, and Young wasn’t even named to the All-Star team as a reserve. Yet, two players in Zach LaVine and Nikola Vucevic -- who were on teams that finished in 11th and 14th place, respectively -- somehow got selected over Young.
This season, Young had career-highs in field goal percentage, free throw percentage, and assists per game. And he was much more willing to get his teammates involved, as he took three less shots per game and penetrated the lane a whole lot more. The efficiency that Young displayed was significantly better than his first two seasons. His improvement as an overall player led to a complete turnaround for Atlanta, as they went 7-1 during the final month of this season. Last season was a very different story for the Hawks -- they won just a quarter of their final month's worth of games with Young as their floor general.
Young doesn’t play under the bright lights of New York City and isn’t seen on Madison Avenue. He doesn’t suit up for a historically great franchise, such as the Boston Celtics. He doesn’t play for the Miami Heat or Orlando Magic in Florida, which has as many billboards as Iowa has potatoes. He isn’t on a team in Los Angeles, where A-list celebrities can’t even afford courtside seats at Staples Center. Young plays for a Hawks team that's resided in Atlanta for the past 53 years and yet to even make an NBA Finals.
Receiving the ultimate respect as a professional athlete is often aligned with how difficult a situation is to overcome. To lead a city to heights that they haven't reached in over five decades? That’s when the respect becomes undeniable. Don’t be shocked if that happens sooner than later, because as we saw on Sunday, the Hawks are building something special.
CBS Sports Radio producer David Shepard is a former ESPN researcher, a former Division I college basketball practice player, and the host of The Good Shepard YouTube channel. Follow him on Twitter @TheGoodShepard_.