Karl-Anthony Towns Had Interesting First Conversation With New Knicks Head Coach Mike Brown

In Towns’ first conversation with his new coach, he decided to take the approach of getting to know him rather than discussing basketball. 

“We got to have a conversation,” said Towns in a YouTube interview with Yahoo Sports. “We got to know each other. I didn't even want to talk basketball with him. I just wanted to be able to understand where he's at in life, and like what's his hobbies, and what's the things that he likes to watch and stuff. So, we [can] have a good relationship, let's not even get basketball involved yet. Let's get to know each other.”

This may not be the prototypical approach to meeting your new head coach, but it’s possible that this personal interaction could reach the rest of the team and be what pushes the Knicks to the NBA Finals. They may not have had a basketball conversation initially, but once they do, they may figure out they could be a player-coach match made in heaven. 

How Will Coach Brown Help Towns on the Floor?

The former No. 1 pick in the 2015 NBA Draft may have had one of the best seasons of his career thus far; it was the deepest he has advanced in the NBA playoffs, as well as being his third All-NBA selection (first since 2022). 

Towns is on record saying he believes he is already the best shooting big man of all time.

“I’m the greatest big man shooter of all time," Towns said in 2021. "That’s a fact. You can see the stats. I ain’t got to play like no one else. Everyone trying to find themselves to be the second version of me when I’m the first version. I don’t got to be the second version of someone else. I’m already an original. I don’t have to be a duplicate of someone else," (via Sports Illustrated).

Last season, Towns recorded his second-highest total of 3-point field goal attempts since the 2019 season while shooting the second-best percentage of his career. 

Coach Brown was fired by the Sacramento Kings in December of last year after a slow start to the season. However, just one year prior, Brown signed an extension with the team after leading the Kings to the third overall seed in the Western Conference. This was the first playoff appearance for Sacramento since 2006, and now New York will hope Brown can achieve more history by bringing the Knicks to their first NBA Finals since 1999.