Knicks fans may already have Christmas Day circled on their calendar as a chance for revenge against Trae Young and the Hawks, but for Julius Randle, it’s just another holiday.
“Being the fact that it’s Atlanta, for me it’s another game,” Randle said on ESPN’s The Jump on Tuesday. “It’s all a part of the process for our season and what we want to build to be where we want to be at for the end of our season. Everything is game by game.”
The NBA announced that New York would be the site of its Christmas Day festivities, as the Knicks will host Atlanta at Madison Square Garden at noon in a rematch of last season’s first-round series, which the Hawks won easily in five games.
For Randle, last year’s Most Improved Player and the face of the Knicks’ stunning resurgence that led to the fourth seed in the Eastern Conference playoffs, playing on Christmas (for what will be the fourth time in his career) is much more meaningful than the opponent, even if everyone else will be focused on Young coming back to The Garden, where he became a hated villain after the playoffs.
“Those are the games you want to be a part of,” Randle said. “Those are definitely the games the NBA highlights, so the fact that you get a Christmas Day game is a huge honor. Obviously there’s a lot of anticipation and all that type of stuff because of the first-round series, but I’m just looking forward to being able to have that experience of playing on Christmas in front of my family and friends.”
The Knicks will return with a large portion of last year’s group still intact, which should keep the memories of last year’s playoff elimination fresh come Christmas. But the team will also be retooled, particularly in the starting five, which should now include Kemba Walker and Evan Fournier, perhaps enough to go toe-to-toe with Atlanta like they did in the first two games of last season’s series.
“We brought back some key guys. Leon and Wes and Scott, those guys did a great job of making us a more versatile team,” Randle said. “Putting more shooting on the floor and guys that can create and get their own shots as well. I’m just excited. It seems like these guys, just talking to them and playing against them, they’ll fit in to our culture and what we’re about really well. So that’s obviously a plus. I think it’s gonna make us a lot more dynamic.”
Follow Ryan Chichester on Twitter: @ryanchichester1
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