NBA Finals oddities: Stunning Karl-Anthony Towns stat, Victor Wembanyama's heel turn and more
The NBA Finals between the New York Knicks and San Antonio Spurs have been as entertaining as anyone could have hoped for -- and even more unexpected. The road team has won all three games. The Spurs had double-digit leads at home and blew both, allowing the Knicks to take a 2-0 series lead. The Knicks had won 13 in a row, only to return to Madison Square Garden for their first Finals game since 1999 and, despite being up seven at the half, suffer their first defeat in 46 days in Game 3 on Monday night.
It's been a wild start to the Finals, with the Knicks leading 2-1 heading into Game 4 on Wednesday. Strange, too. Here are five other oddities from the series thus far.
Jalen Brunson's miscues
Brunson had his best outing of the Finals in Game 3, and the Knicks still lost. That's not saying much about his performance, though. Everything is relative. Aside from the fourth quarter of Game 1, Brunson hasn't played up to his usual standards. He went for 32 points on Monday night in front of the home crowd, but he needed 25 shots to do it. And while he had five assists in the 115-111 loss, he also had five turnovers.
That last part has been an uncharacteristic struggle for Brunson. During the regular season, he averaged 6.8 assists against just 2.4 turnovers. But in the three games against San Antonio, he has the same number of total assists as turnovers: 13. Not surprisingly, that's the worst assist-to-turnover ratio for him this postseason. He was at 2.47 in the first round against the Atlanta Hawks, 3.43 in the second round against the Philadelphia 76ers and 3.1 in the Eastern Conference Finals against the Cleveland Cavaliers.
Part of that is owed to the Spurs being uniquely suited to guard and frustrate Brunson. San Antonio has a host of large, physical, athletic guards and wings to throw at him. If you were going to design a group meant to slow him down, you'd be hard-pressed to do better than Stephon Castle, Devin Vassell, Julian Champagnie, Dylan Harper and (to a lesser extent, which we will get to in a moment) Keldon Johnson.
But while the Spurs deserve credit for their defense, Brunson hasn't been nearly as good as we're used to him being. After Game 3, Karl-Anthony Towns was asked about the officiating, but rather than blame the refs, he matter-of-factly stated that the turnovers were actually what doomed the Knicks. Towns wasn't wrong. They all have to be better with the ball, especially Brunson.
Karl-Anthony Towns' fourth-quarter struggles
There was a case to be made that Towns was the series MVP through the first two games. He got the better of Victor Wembanyama in Game 1 and followed that up with another big performance in Game 2. He wasn't nearly as effective on Monday night, but he still put up 11 points, eight rebounds, three steals and two blocks. What he didn't do, yet again, was score in the fourth quarter.
While Towns has been terrific for much of the series, the final frame has not been kind to him so far. Towns took just 10 shots in Game 3. Four of those came in the fourth quarter. He didn't make any of them. That's been an unfortunate trend for Towns. He has somehow yet to score in the fourth quarter.
In Game 1, he was 7 for 15 from the floor overall, but he missed his lone field goal attempt in the fourth. In Game 2, he shot 8 of 12 from the floor but once again took and missed one lonely shot in the last quarter.
> Karl-Anthony Towns has not scored a point in the 4th quarter in the NBA Finals, even as he's had a very good series for the Knicks.
His combined 4th quarter stats against the Spurs:
29.1 minutes played
0-of-6 from the field
0-of-2 on 3s
0 FT attempts
— Mike Vorkunov (@MikeVorkunov) June 9, 2026
Towns has been excellent this postseason, but his fourth-quarter issues can't continue if the Knicks want to prevent the Spurs from tying the series.
Keldon Johnson, the not-so-super sub
Back to Johnson. He played all 82 regular-season games and shot 51.9% from the field, 36.3% from 3 and 79.4% from the foul line, all of which were above his career averages. He also played solid defense and gave coach Mitch Johnson a reliable two-way option off the bench. For his efforts, he was voted the NBA's Sixth Man of the Year, beating out Jaime Jaquez Jr. of the Miami Heat and Tim Hardaway Jr. of the Denver Nuggets.
But for as good as Johnson was during the regular season, he's been equally bad against the Knicks. Through the first three games, he's averaging 4.3 points, 2.0 rebounds, 0.7 assists, and a turnover in 13.6 minutes with 38.5/25/33.3 shooting splits.
Those are ugly numbers for anyone, let alone the Sixth Man of the Year. Johnson was bad enough in Game 3 that Mitch Johnson opted to go with his three guards for long stretches. De'Aaron Fox, Castle and Harper played 19 possessions together and were minus-17. And yet the Spurs coach preferred that to playing Johnson extended minutes. Not great for Keldon or the Spurs.
Stephon Castle calmly knocks down biggest shots o