BOSTON — Are you celebrating something you hope to accomplish?
For the Knicks, the answer is yes — but they know there are bigger fish to fry in New York City.
The Knicks clinched their second straight playoff berth and their third in the last four seasons on Wednesday night, when the Miami Heat’s 19-point loss to the Dallas Mavericks made it impossible for New York to finish any lower in the sixth in the East.
With three games left on the schedule (including Thursday’s matchup at TD Garden against the No. 1-seeded Celtics), the Knicks can take a second to catch their breath.
“We celebrated,” head coach Tom Thibodeau said before tipoff against the Celtics on Thursday. “We just want to be aware. So as you go along, you just check the boxes. You take it one step at a time.”
But just a second. Maybe a fraction of a tick for a team that still has a lot to lose if they drop the ball in the final frame of the regular season.
The job doesn’t end with making the playoffs. Instead of a team hoping to one-up itself and last season’s second-round playoff appearance, there’s plenty of meat left on the bone in the 2023-24 NBA season.
“[Clinching the playoffs means] Nothing,” said Knicks forward Josh Hart. “There is none — we expected to do it at the beginning of the year. It’s cool. We’re going to the playoffs.”
The Celtics were the only team that actually got a celebration.
Boston is home to a team that is 14 games better than the next best Eastern Conference squad. If the Celtics had punted in their last two regular season games, they would still have finished with a better record than every other team in basketball.
The Knicks have no such luxury.
If the Knicks lose their last three games, they could fall as low as sixth, and if they win — and get some help from the Giannis Antetokounmpo-less Milwaukee Bucks — New York could finish No. 2 seeds.
The last time the Knicks finished second in the East, Carmelo Anthony led the team to a 54-win season and a second-round playoff appearance.
“It’s not over. You’ve got to cross the finishing line,” Thibodeau said. “And for some teams — the Celtics have built a big cushion, so they’re in a different category — but for the rest of us, all we’re fighting for seeding and home-court and things like that. So that’s our challenge.”
The Knicks have two more games left on the schedule after Thursday’s potential Eastern Conference Finals preview: They host the Brooklyn Nets at Madison Square Garden in the second leg of a back-to-back on Friday, then host the Chicago Bulls in the season finale on Sunday.
Climbing into a playoff berth is cool — but the Knicks have bigger fish to fry, the fish being their own playoff run that fell in the second round courtesy of the Miami Heat last season.
“[Making the playoffs] is something to look forward to,” Hart said. “So it’s cool, but I’m not gonna sit there and be like oh my god, I’m so excited. That’s what we look forward to doing.”
