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By Bryan Colbert Jr.
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Jalen Brunson needed one quarter to outscore the Chicago Bulls on Wednesday night.
What happened after that put the New York Knicks in the record book.
Brunson scored just four points in the second quarter, but his teammates added 37 more to send New York into halftime with an 84-52 lead on its way to a 135-105 win at Madison Square Garden.
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According to ESPN Insights, those 84 points were the most the Knicks have scored in either half at the current Garden.
They also tied the franchise record for points in a first half, a mark that had stood since Nov. 18, 1988. The Knicks reached it that night in Philadelphia and still went home with a 137-135 loss to the 76ers.
Chicago had little chance of pulling off a similar escape.
The Bulls led 6-4 before New York scored eight straight points to take the lead for good.
Brunson made eight of his 10 shots in the opening quarter, including four of five from 3-point range. By the time the horn sounded, he had 22 points, the rest of the Knicks had 21 and New York had more than doubled Chicago’s total.
The Bulls found some offense in the second quarter, scoring 31 points after managing 21 in the first.
Yet even with Brunson accounting for only two more baskets’ worth of points, New York extended its lead by another 10.
The Knicks followed their 43-point opening quarter with 41 in the second, marking the first time in franchise history they had scored at least 40 in each of the first two quarters.
Brunson finished with 33 points in 28 minutes and watched the fourth quarter from the bench. OG Anunoby scored 18, while Karl-Anthony Towns added 17 points and 12 rebounds.
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Dalton Knecht also made the most of his Knicks debut, contributing 10 points and seven rebounds in 16 minutes.
New York has won four of five since opening the season with three straight losses, bringing the Knicks back to .500 ahead of their matchup with Cleveland.
Chicago fell to 1-7 with its sixth consecutive defeat.
By the time Brunson took a seat for the fourth quarter, Chicago had scored 79 points in 36 minutes.
The Knicks had given their home crowd 84 in 24. In all their years at the current Madison Square Garden, they had never played a higher-scoring half.
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