Monday night, the New York Knicks took care of business against their cross-borough rival, the Brooklyn Nets, winning handily by a final score of 113-100 out at Barclays Center.
While this seamless triumph was certainly one to celebrate on its own, as it now slides the surging Knickerbockers back into the top five in the Eastern Conference standings at 10-6, the fact that it now makes Nets center, Nic Claxton's old remarks on this Big Apple-based rivalry look even more regrettable has the taste of victory feeling all the more sweet.
Back in 2023, the center made some rather choice comments regarding his thoughts on squaring off against New York, specifically noting that he "always" has fun when the two teams play because, from his understanding, he had "never lost to the Knicks" since entering the league in 2019.
At the time these comments were made, in games where he was active in the lineup, Claxton had actually seen just one loss against New York (January 1, 2020). Considering he sported an overall record of 6-1, his remarks were far from an outlandish exaggeration.
Unfortunately for him, however, this once-confident quote has now seemingly aged like milk over the past few years, as his success rate has plummeted to a whopping zero percent when playing the Knicks.
Nic Claxton has gone win-less when playing Knicks since infamous quote
The night in which Claxton's quotes were registered actually proved to be the last time they held any semblance of truth.
Over the years since, the Knicks and Nets have played each other on 12 separate occasions, two of which have come during these early stages of the 2025-26 campaign alone.
Throughout this stretch, Brooklyn has gone 0-12 and has been outscored by an average of 12.9 points per contest.
Claxton, meanwhile, has by no means excelled in these face-offs from an individual perspective, as he's averaged a middling 8.8 points, 8.3 rebounds, and 1.4 blocks on 47.8 percent shooting from the field along the way.
Most recently, he was seen wrapping up his performance against New York with a -17 in the plus-minus department (third-worst on the team), recording just eight points, four boards, and a block on 25.0 percent shooting from the field in 26 minutes played.
As a result, Brooklyn finds itself plummeting even further down the standings with a putrid record of 3-14 while Claxton, personally, feels the sting of his old remarks coming back to bite him.