Early in the first quarter, you could hear a stray “F*** Trae Young!” chant or two from the rafters at MSG. Those fans obviously know the diminutive point guard who sent the Knicks home from the playoffs in 2021 is no longer a member of the Atlanta roster; they just hadn’t identified a substitute villain worthy of their derision and scorn.

I think they have one now.

In Game 1, CJ McCollum kicked Jalen Brunson below the belt on a jump shot, then claimed the Knicks star was acting in search of an unwarranted call. (He later rescinded that claim; the NBA did not rescind the technical he received for the kick.) In Game 2, though, he hit the entire city of New York where the sun don’t shine.

McCollum scored a game-high 32 points on 12-for-22 shooting to pace a Hawks team that desperately needed both the leadership and the buckets he could provide. When nobody else in a Hawks uniform could get untracked against a swarming New York defense early, McCollum scored 18 points in the first half to keep the Knicks from running away. When Jose Alvarado, his former Pelicans teammate, was giving the Knicks a boost late in the third quarter, McCollum stepped up to him:

That bout of jawing that resulted in double technical fouls — and a new chant inside MSG:

And after a spirited early fourth-quarter comeback put the game back within striking distance when McCollum checked back in with 7:38 to go in the game — to a chorus of boos from the Garden stands — he was the one who seized it.

A drive-and-kick to set up Alexander-Walker for a corner 3 cut a six-point deficit in half with just over four minutes to go. A filthy move put Brunson on skates, clearing the lane for a runner to give the Hawks the lead with 2:08 remaining.

Another iso-torching of Brunson after a pair of missed OG Anunoby free throws pushed the lead to 103-100 with just over 90 seconds in regulation. And after Brunson drilled a pull-up 3 to knot the game, McCollum answered right back, this time beating All-Defensive wing OG Anunoby with a tough baseline fadeaway to give the Hawks a lead they would not relinquish. Not even after he missed a pair of free throws with 5.6 seconds to go, giving New York one last chance that, like the rest of that fateful fourth quarter, went awry, leveling the series and earning McCollum a moniker that he doesn’t necessarily seem to relish.

“I am no villain,” McCollum said after the game. “I am a nice guy with two kids and a wife.”

The people of New York would beg to differ. And now, thanks to McCollum’s work, they’ll get another chance to tell him so when the Hawks come back here for Game 5 next Tuesday.

The Knicks led by 14 midway through the third quarter, and by 12 at the start of the fourth — a lead built on the strength of a balanced scoring effort, with six players in double figures, and by leveraging their size advantages to the tune of 10 offensive rebounds leading to 22 second-chance points, a 37-24 edge on the boards and a 50-36 advantage in points in the paint.

And then, in the fourth quarter, virtually all of that evaporated.

A Knicks team that had the NBA’s best fourth-quarter net rating and that outscored opponents by more than 20 points per 100 possessions in “clutch” situations during the regular season managed just 15 points on 5-for-22 shooting in the final frame. Before hitting two big 3-pointers in the last minute and a half, Brunson had missed three of his four fourth-quarter tries, continuing a cold snap ever since that red-hot start to Game 1. He is now 19-for-48 (39.6%) in this series, just 12-for-34 (35.3%) in the paint and only 3-for-11 (27.3%) in the fourth quarter — a far cry from the crunch-time heroics we’ve come to expect from New York’s captain.

And after keeping Atlanta’s offense largely under wraps from halftime of Game 1 through the start of the fourth in Game 2, the Knicks couldn’t get a stop when it counted on Monday. The Hawks shot 13-for-18 from the field in the fourth quarter, with 11 of those buckets coming in the paint, as McCollum, Jalen Johnson and reserve Jonathan Kuminga (who scored seven of his 19 points in the fourth) repeatedly attacked the basket with little to no resistance from New York’s defense.

A team that was one of the NBA’s best at winning the possession battle during the regular season coughed up a pair of costly turnovers. A team that finished 10th in the NBA in team free-throw percentage at just under 80% for the season saw Anunoby miss a pair with 1:54 to go and the Hawks up by 1 — two of 10 missed free throws in 27 chances for New York in Game 2. A team that has renewed its efforts to weaponize the two-man game between Brunson and Karl-Anthony Towns again went whisper quiet late when Snyder flipped the switch, sliding Kuminga over to Towns and Okongwu onto Hart, with the Knicks offense again reduced largely to stagnancy, deep 3s and hard-fought Brunson shot creation in isolation.

When he’s making those shots, MSG is the loudest place on earth, and the Knicks are awfully tough to beat. When he’s not … well, the World’s Most Famous Arena can get awfully quiet, awfully fast.

For the bulk of Game 2, Knicks starters were outplaying their counterparts. In search of a spark — and, to some degree, of more playable bodies, with Okongwu battling right knee inflammation and backup center Mouhamed Gueye limited by a hip contusion — Snyder dusted off lightly used wing Corey Kispert (who came along with McCollum from D.C. in the Trae Young trade) and just-signed backup center Tony Bradley (who received some boos from Knicks fans who remember his work as a member of the Pacers during the 2025 Eastern Conference finals).

Both contributed: two points, a rebound, an assist, a steal and a block in 12 minutes for Bradley; a pair of runout layups, a pair of rebounds, an assist and a steal in nine minutes for Kispert. While New York lineups led by Deuce McBride, Landry Shamet, Jordan Clarkson and Mitchell Robinson struggled mightily to stay afloat, Bradley, Kispert, Kuminga and veteran Gabe Vincent gave Snyder just enough to help tilt the game back in Atlanta’s favor — a reminder that, as Brown told reporters before Game 2, nobody gets to springtime by accident.

“I caution everybody, anybody: That’s why these things are seven-game series,” Brown said. “Because at this point in the year, everybody that’s playing is good, and they’re bringing something to the table.”

What the Hawks brought to the table on Monday was enough to leave the Knicks unsettled and shell-shocked — and now, in need of a road win to win this series.