SAN ANTONIO — Donte DiVincenzo is the new Knicks’ 3-point king.
The shooting guard nailed six treys in Friday night’s 130-126 OT loss to the Spurs, raising his total to 245 for the season to pass previous record-holder Evan Fournier.
DiVincenzo broke Fournier’s mark of 241 with his 3-pointer toward the end of the first half, already his third of the night.
“It’s cool, it’s a cool accomplishment. You look at the list of who is on there, it’s special,” DiVincenzo said. “We still have nine games to go. So there’s no real pressure. Just go out there and take the shots I’ve been taking all year.”
He shot 7 of 13 against the Spurs — including 6 of 12 on treys — with 20 points in 49 minutes.
The summer signing entered the game first in the Eastern Conference in 3-pointers made by a wide margin, having established himself as an elite outside shooter since joining the starting lineup.
After DiVincenzo and Fournier on the all-time list come Julius Randle (2023), John Starks (1995) and J.R. Smith (2014).
Earlier this week, DiVincenzo set the Knicks’ single-game record with 11 3-pointers, topping the 10 hit by Fournier (2022) and JR Smith (2014).
Isaiah Hartenstein said the X-rays on his hands were negative after he took a hard spill during Friday’s game but was encouraged by that result.
“It’s cool,” he said. “It’s maybe just a light sprain, that’s it.”
San Antonio’s Cedi Osman was whistled for a flagrant foul on the play with 5:13 left in the fourth quarter because he threw Hartenstein down.
The man responsible for bringing Randle to the Knicks is now worried about the effectiveness of the All-Star when/if he comes back for the playoffs.
“The reason I’m concerned — I’ll take you back to last year when he was having a terrific season last year and then he [suffered a serious ankle sprain] with five games left in the regular season,” Scott Perry, the former GM, told Knicks Fan TV on Friday. “And when he came back in the playoffs, he never really was able to regain the same rhythm that he had. And Julius is a rhythm player.”
Randle, who hasn’t played in over two months and missed his 27th straight game Friday, struggled in last year’s playoffs and underwent ankle surgery.
He recovered his top form this season before dislocating his shoulder, prompting the long and ongoing recovery.
After Friday’s game, the Knicks only have nine remaining before the playoffs.
Perry, who was the Knicks GM for six years and signed Randle as a free agent in 2019, said the power forward will be harder to incorporate than OG Anunoby, who plays off the ball and has missed six straight games because of “injury management.”
“Not only does [Randle] need that time to figure out his place on the court, the guys who are playing with him now have to get used to another guy who has the ball in his hands a lot,” Perry said. “Jalen Brunson is a ball dominant player too so you now you have two of them on the floor. … So there’s a lot going on there from a chemistry aspect that has me concerned.”
The other issue for Perry is the pain in the shoulder area and how it will impact Randle’s effectiveness.
Without surgery (which Randle opted against), there’s a high risk of re-injury with dislocated shoulders.
“Julius is very physical in dishing out contact with that right shoulder to get the space to get that shot off,” Perry said. “You wonder if that shoulder is going to be strong enough to take that kind of pounding.”
