Julius Randle Caught Fire And Dropped 44 On The Hawks In A Knicks Win

The New York Knicks entered Monday night’s game with the Hawks tied with the Hornets for sixth in the East at 13-15, thanks in large part to the sensational, All-Star worthy season Julius Randle has been having so far.

Randle is averaging 22.4 points and 11.1 rebounds per game, and has become a legitimately good three-point shooter at 39.4 percent. The skidding Hawks came into MSG needing a win desperately, but Randle refused to oblige as he went off for a season-high 44 points to lead the Knicks to a win in the highest scoring performance by a Knick since Carmelo Anthony back in January 2017.

The Hawks fell behind by double digits early, but clawed back to take a lead in the third quarter and kept things close for much of the game. However, Randle put them away with his career-high seven made threes, and some incredibly tough buckets late in a sensational individual performance to lead New York to a 123-112 win.

Helping Randle on Monday was R.J. Barrett with 21 points and seven rebounds and Immanuel Quickley with 16 points and five assists off the bench, but in closing time Nerlens Noel made a number of big plays on defense and punctuated the win with a vicious putback dunk over John Collins.

After the game, his teammates took the mic in the postgame interview to make sure they put it out there that he is indeed an All-Star this year, and you’d be hard-pressed to find an argument against that right now.