New York Knicks head coach Mike Brown is championing his star point guard, Jalen Brunson, as a strong contender for the NBA’s Most Valuable Player award.

“He’s clearly an All-Star and absolutely deserves to be in the MVP conversation,” Brown remarked ahead of the Knicks’ matchup against the Milwaukee Bucks on Friday. “It’s not surprising if you spend any time around him. His work ethic and intensity make it obvious why he’s in this position.”

As of Friday, Brunson has been averaging an impressive 30.3 points per game, shooting at 51.6 percent over his last five appearances. Over the season, he maintains an average of 28.6 points with a shooting accuracy of 48.3 percent, all while playing one minute less per game compared to last season.

In the league standings, Brunson is currently seventh in scoring, trailing behind notable players such as Luka Dončić (35.2), Shai Gilgeous-Alexander (32.6), Tyrese Maxey (32.2), Giannis Antetokounmpo (31.2), Donovan Mitchell (29.9), and Nikola Jokić (29.6). Among these top scorers, Brunson ranks third in shots per game at 21.3, and he has increased his shooting attempts to 22.8 over the past five games.

Coach Brown is particularly impressed with the versatility of Brunson’s scoring methods.

“What’s most important is his ability to score efficiently without overexerting himself,” Brown explained. “He’s scoring through various means: catch-and-shoot, driving to the rim, navigating dribble hand-offs, executing pick-and-rolls, and working in isolation. Our focus is to keep him dynamic while managing his minutes, ensuring he remains fresh and not overly depended upon to carry the team every time.”

Brunson’s isolations are down from 17.3% of his offense last season to 13.5% under Brown, and his catch-and-shoot threes have skyrocketed. He’s taking 3.1 per game and hitting 46.8% — the best mark on the team and fourth-best in the league among players averaging 30+ minutes. Under Tom Thibodeau, he took only 1.9 per game despite shooting 42.2%.

CHANGE IN THE OFFENSE

Bucks head coach Doc Rivers says the Knicks look significantly different than they did when the two teams met on Oct. 28.

“They’re not playing the same as they played earlier in the year,” Rivers said before Friday’s matchup at Madison Square Garden. “Earlier in the year, they were all drive-and-kick, very few pick-and-rolls.”

Milwaukee beat the Knicks, 121-111, in that October meeting — the second of five straight road losses to open New York’s season. Rivers said the biggest shift is how much more the Knicks are leaning on the Brunson–Karl-Anthony Towns partnership.

“Now they’ve gone back to the Brunson-Towns pick-and-roll — which makes a lot of sense — and yet they’re still trying to move the ball and play downhill and play draw-and-kick basketball,” Rivers said. “But I think the biggest change they have made since we played them is they have definitely added more pick-and-rolls since than they had when we played them the first game.”

Brunson ranks fifth in the NBA in scoring as a pick-and-roll ball handler: 9.7 points on 9.8 possessions per game. Towns ranks 10th among roll men at 3.6 points per possession.

NO-SAN FOR TOSAN

Brown also offered praise for Tosan Evbuomwan, the 6-7 forward signed to a two-way contract this offseason, though he stopped short of committing to a larger role while OG Anunoby (hamstring) and Landry Shamet (shoulder) remain out.

“[Tosan is] a big wing, and he’s capable of guarding a lot of different positions, and he’s got some skill offensively, and early during the preseason he played well for us when we threw him in there. I want to say we threw him in there (in the regular season) in one of those early games and he was big. I know in the preseason he was big for us a couple times. You like his physicality. You like the way he moves his feet. You like the way he rebounds and some other things and he can potentially get some minutes for us,” Brown said. “With OG being out, and Landry too – we wanted another big wing. He’s a young guy that could fit what we’re looking for going forward. I’m excited about him, and we’ll just see what happens in time.”