Jalen Brunson’s Finals MVP run was a reminder of something the Knicks can’t afford to forget: in the East, the Pacers are still lurking.
New York may have just won the 2026 NBA Championship, but that does not mean Tyrese Haliburton and Indiana have disappeared from the picture. Haliburton is expected back fully healthy after tearing his Achilles during the 2025 NBA Finals, and the Pacers are not shaping up like one of the conference’s easy outs. They were close to the top two years ago, and the core that pushed them there is still intact.
That matters for a Knicks team trying to do something only one team has done in the last nine years: win back-to-back championships. The East is loading up around them, and Indiana belongs in that group.
Haliburton gives the Pacers a top-10 player. Pascal Siakam gives them a top-25 one.
Add the rest of the supporting cast, and the outline starts to look a lot like a real contender.
Brunson’s postseason only sharpened the point. He won Finals MVP by consistently making the right play, and that kind of decision-making is becoming more valuable than ever in today’s NBA.
Teams now have more data than ever telling them which shots to take, how often they’ll go in, and how to manage every possession. In that environment, the players who keep choosing correctly stand out fast.
That is why Haliburton still belongs in the conversation, even after last season took him off the board. His game is built around that same kind of precision. He’s not the only playmaker in Indiana, either.
Siakam brings championship experience from his time with the Toronto Raptors, and he still looks like one of the league’s 20 best players. Dunks & Threes had his offensive estimated plus-minus for the 2025-26 season at +2.2, which placed him in the 92nd percentile of NBA players.
The Pacers still have work to do before they can be called complete. They need more depth, whether that comes through trade, free agency, or internal growth.
But they are closer to being back in the championship mix than plenty of people seem willing to admit. The Knicks can ignore Haliburton and Indiana if they want.
That would be a mistake.
In Other News...
NBA Star Just Said What Knicks Fans Have Been Waiting To Hear
At Fanatics Fest, Anthony Edwards added a little more fuel to the buzz around Jalen Brunson by putting the Knicks guard in the center of the leaguewide conversation. Edwards pointed to Brunsons championship run and Finals MVP season as the kind of rsum that can carry real weight when people start talking about who should be the face of the NBA, a topic that always seems to circle back to New York when the Knicks are winning at a high level.
Edwards also made clear he sees that label as something earned, not claimed, and said he has not won a title himself. For Knicks fans, the bigger takeaway is probably the respect coming from one of the games brightest young stars, even as Edwards also mentioned giving Karl-Anthony Towns advice before games against the San Antonio Spurs, a reminder that the leagues biggest names are still talking about each other as the season turns. [Read more 🡒]
Jalen Brunson Revisits The Knicks Pay Cut That Changed Everything
Jalen Brunsons decision to stay with the Knicks on a shorter financial path came up again at the Wall Street Journals WSJ Sports event, where he revisited the choice that helped define both his own career arc and the franchises rise. He acknowledged the risk at the time, but framed it as a bet on his game and on the place he had already found in New York.
The payoff was hard to miss in the 2025-26 season, when the Knicks turned that stability into an NBA championship and Brunson played with a kind of freedom that fit the moment. He made clear the money was never the only issue, saying the security around him let him focus on basketball without carrying the weight of uncertainty. [Read more 🡒]