Kristian Winfield: Karl-Anthony Towns wanted to be Magic Johnson. Mike Brown is letting him.

NEW YORK — The Toronto Raptors brought the double-team. Karl-Anthony Towns made them pay.

It’s the opening possession of the Knicks’ 112-95 victory over the Raptors on Friday, and Towns has the size advantage on the low block over Toronto’s Scottie Barnes. Mikal Bridges cuts from the top of the 3-point line under the rim, forcing the closest big man, Jakob Poeltl, to make a decision.

Poeltl decides to leave Bridges altogether and doubles Towns from the weak side.

Just as the All-Star Knicks big man anticipated. Just as he’s practiced for all his career as a superior scoring 7-footer who prides himself on making plays for his teammates.

Before Poeltl can complete the double-team, Towns looks to the 3-point line then rifles a right-handed pass over his own head to Bridges for the easy 2 under the rim. These plays, Towns says, are just as important, just as fulfilling to his game as putting 30 points or 20 rebounds on the board.

“Oh man. [Playmaking] means the world to me. That’s why I wear the No. 32,” he says. “My dad loved Magic Johnson. I love getting play-making going. So it’s fun when I get to get that assist and get that playmaking going.”

The Knicks have been working all season to strike the perfect balance between their two All-Star offensive options. With one game left on the schedule before the playoffs — a game the Knicks could punt in the name of longevity for a deep postseason run — head coach Mike Brown, and his players, feel confident and comfortable with the direction the ship has sailed in the latter stretch of the season.

That ship now more focally features Towns, not just as a scoring threat — though his points have been a plus coming out of the All-Star break — but as a hub the Knicks can use to generate scoring opportunities for other players when defenses load up on New York’s starting center.

And Towns isn’t going to force the issue. He’s going to make the best available play, and the Knicks are allowing him to lean into a strength that could help elevate their ceiling and reach the NBA Finals for the first time since 1999.

“I feel like I can make a pass anywhere on the court, but I’ve got great teammates who are very talented,” Towns says. “And also, we just seem to find a lot of ways with back cuts and things that work. So I’m just taking what the defense gives, utilizing their personnel, what they do best and what they do worst, and using that against them.”

———

Brown may not have coached Towns in the past, but he’s certainly coached against him. He knows the scouting report well. And while Towns considers himself the best 3-point shooting big man of all time, the passing aspect of his game has gone underrated.

In New York, it went underutilized.

Towns’ average of three assists per game this season ties his fewest since 2018. It’s a trend spanning his entire stat line in Year 1 under Brown: fewer shot attempts, fewer points, near career-worst field goal and 3-point efficiency. This, in all accounts, has been a down season for the talented big man who snuck into the mid-February All-Star Game as a reserve this season.

At least it was a down year until the second week of March. Towns had 25 points and 16 rebounds in a March 8 loss to the Los Angeles Lakers. He had 35 points, 12 rebounds and seven assists the following night, another loss to the Los Angeles Clippers. And then it happened: seven more assists the following game, a near triple-double in a victory over the Utah Jazz.

Towns is averaging more points and assists from the Laker game through the end of the season than he did from the beginning of the season through the first week of March. He is shooting a respectable percentage (38.5%) from 3-point range after a steep drop-off from his career average of 40% to start the season.

Most importantly, the Knicks have been using Towns as a play-making hub more often. Brown said the Knicks had been utilizing Towns’ playmaking abilities all season — but not like this. The Knicks have been intentionally running actions designed to use Towns as a play-maker with teammates cutting off of him around the 3-point line and the elbow.

“We felt that [Towns could be a play-maker] at the beginning of the year. We have actions that we’ve been calling from Day 1 to where he’s in space and doing that. And we’ve gone through spurts, executing it,” Brown says. “There was a spurt not too long ago where we weren’t doing a good job even getting [the ball to him to make plays]. So I’ve been helping him a little bit more from the sidelines. And it’s paid dividends.

“But we’ve always felt that he can be that hub. We just didn’t always get there like a bunch.”

———

The Knicks have been getting there in the month of April, coincidentally as the playoffs get closer. They’ve been running more actions involving both Towns and Jalen Brunson, but New York is also putting the ball in its center’s hands and trusting him to make plays for himself or his teammates.

Towns is finding his teammates.

He is averaging 6.5 assists over his last four games, an average of twice as many in the lead-into the playoffs than he registered the entire regular season (3.0). He had a 20-point triple-double with 11 dimes in the Knicks’ April 1 matchup against the Memphis Grizzlies. He added six more in the April 6 win over the Atlanta Hawks, four in Thursday’s win over the Boston Celtics and five more on Friday’s second leg of a back-to-back against the Toronto Raptors.

Towns credits his roots growing up in Piscataway, N.J., just a 45-minute from Madison Square Garden, the arena he now calls home. He’s had to adjust his game to accommodate all kinds of basketball talents at all junctures of his career. That helps him now, in Year 2 with the Knicks, learning the different tendencies for his teammates — where OG Anunoby likes the ball vs. Mikal Bridges or Josh Hart.

“I’m a Jersey kid, so I play a lot off feel — just feel and reaction and just feeling the game, knowing my teammates should be here in a step or two,” he says. “That’s what practice is for. So just trying to make that play. Sometimes I’m just a fingernail away.”

Towns’ comfort level has been a work in progress all season for Brown, who was brought in to maximize his skill set. The early returns were shaky, but with some adjustments — and with some time — Brown has brought the best version of his All-Star center to the floor.

“I think he is pretty comfortable. But, you know, it’s not all on his shoulders: I’ve got to take some of that, too, because I had to figure out how to help him become comfortable without taking away from everybody else. And that’s what a season’s for,” Brown says. “It’s for you to experiment — or dabble in this, dabble in that, or pull back here, or give a little more there — whatever it takes to try to make sure [the system] fits well for everybody without making it too one-sided.”

The offense, for the first time all season, looks balanced. Brown has struck the right chord: The ball is moving. All five players on the floor touch the rock. If they don’t have an advantage, they work the ball back to one of the two All-Stars.

Brunson and Towns look more like a two-man tandem now than ever before. Part of that process has been Brunson letting go and allowing Towns to generate offense.

It’s been working — and it kills several birds with one stone: Towns is equally fulfilled as a playmaker and scorer, and creating for his teammates, Brunson included, helps bind the Knicks together on the offensive end.

Towns may not be Magic Johnson. But he plays with flair and wears No. 32. And Brown is going to let his 7-footer make plays. He hopes those plays can help the Knicks reach heights Magic rose to with the Showtime Lakers in the 1980s.

“We feel like we’re in a pretty good place with it. You know, I think it’s been a couple of months now that we’ve felt pretty good about it,” Brown says. “It’s not going to always be perfect, but it definitely is in a good place and a better place than when we started.”