The Knicks spoil RJ Barrett’s revenge game with a narrow win over the Raptors

TORONTO – RJ Barrett was about to make a statement, a vendetta against the team he believed no longer wanted him around.

Barrett drove to the hoop with 29 seconds left, his Raptors trailing by two seconds.

Barrett had already tied a game-high score and was just one yard away from completing it.

Instead, OG Anunoby, the player traded for Barrett almost a year ago, was the hero on Monday night.

Anunoby jumped behind Barrett and rejected the attempt for a moment emblematic of the big deal.

“This is the OG game, man,” Karl-Anthony Towns said of Anunoby’s first game at Scotia Bank Arena. “It meant a lot to him. And we wanted to make sure we got that for him. … OG is one of the best two-way players in the NBA. So I don’t know why we would expect anything less from him.”

However, Barrett led all scorers with 30 points.

He was successful with a stat line that indicated he had surpassed Anunoby.

But the Raptors lost.

And the Knicks won 113-108 because Anunoby came through with the big defensive play.

“OG just has a knack for playing defense,” Jalen Brunson said. “When it looks like no one can make the game, he just does it. Night in, night out. That’s what he does.”

Barrett shot 13 of 24 but missed 9 of 15 attempts in the second half.

Cities was the opposite.

He struggled with his shot most of the night, but hit two of the most important ones: a layup after a nice feed from Brunson for the lead with 36 seconds left, then the dagger trey after Anunoby’s block.

It saved the Knicks (15-9) from an ugly loss to the struggling Raptors (7-18).

“I just fought, man,” Towns said. “We just fought. It’s that simple. In the end, it’s really well implemented.”

Barrett posted the best results of his career this season, a reward, he said, for playing in a faster system with more options on the ball.

Barrett revealed before Monday’s game that he was excited about the trade when it happened.

He had received indications from the Knicks that he was no longer in their plans.

“A lot of stuff (made me feel like I was going to get traded). “A lot of stuff,” Barrett said Monday after taking a deep breath. “I think I just got a vibe, kind of thought. I wasn’t really surprised when it happened.”

Unspoken but likely a factor was that Barrett had risen from future leader of the franchise to a distant third place on the totem pole under Julius Randle and especially Brunson.

By playing Barrett and Immanuel Quickley for Anunoby, the Knicks created a lineup that gave Brunson the ball and further increased his stardom.

It worked as intended for the Knicks. Anunoby, who scored 14 points in 41 minutes, proved that he is a defender who can be effective offensively even without the ball.

Brunson became an All-Star.

“OG was different,” Thibodeau explained of the trade on Monday. “His versatility and size were something we were looking for.”

For the Raptors, the sentiment surrounding the trade is more complicated.

On the one hand, the team was in the midst of a rebuild and had little use for Anunoby, who likely would have left in free agency anyway.

On the other hand, the Raptors have been doing poorly since the deal and Quickley is out indefinitely with an elbow injury.

It played out on a micro level on Monday.

The Knicks had their worst home performance of the season, a 120-111 loss to the Pistons that came without an injured Towns.

The center returned Monday with 24 points and 15 balls, including the decisive throws in the last minute.

After Towns’ layup, Barrett’s chance was denied by Anunoby.

“I played a lot of home games here, so it was weird to be on the other side,” Anunoby said. “But great.”