The New York Knicks paid a king's ransom to add Mikal Bridges in the offseason, and the defensive play he made against the Chicago Bulls at the end of regulation of their Thursday night tilt shows just why they coveted him.

The New York Knicks won a nailbiter in overtime against the Chicago Bulls on Thursday, Feb. 20. Mikal Bridges secured a game-saving block for the Knicks during the dying moments of regulation, swatting away Nikola Vucevic‘s shot attempt out of a designed play to give the Knicks a chance to avoid embarrassment in overtime.

Bridges, physically overmatched, remained in between Vucevic and the basket, leapt quickly and swatted the ball and the Bulls’ chances away to send the game into an overtime that the Knicks survived, 113-111, on Thursday at the Garden.

The Knicks pulled out a hard-fought OT win over the Bulls on Thursday night, but it could have been a different story without Mikal Bridges' defense.

Mikal Bridges struggled to contain Trae Young most of the night. But he shut him down when it mattered most. Young scored 38 points and dished 19 assists in the Knicks’ 149-148 win over the Hawks on Wednesday night at Madison Square Garden, helping lead a wild Atlanta comeback in the fourth quarter to force overtime.