New York Knicks head coach Mike Brown has taken the gloves off. 

The Knicks lost their fourth straight game on Monday against an 18-26 Dallas Mavericks team that was missing Anthony Davis and Kyrie Irving. It's the Knicks' ninth loss in 11 games since winning the NBA Cup and the same problems that have plagued them since that win showed up again against Dallas. 

Throughout this entire downward spiral, Brown has remained calm and contemplative in his postgame interviews. He's been aware of the flaws the Knicks have, of course, but throughout it all he's expressed confidence that his team can pull out of their skid and been steady in what they need to do to get better. 

But after Monday's loss, Brown came in hot. His tone was different. He was incensed at the way they played and he didn't hold back in his criticism, even going so far as to let out an expletive before he composed himself again. 

Brown's consistent gripe with his team in their struggles has been a lack of effort and commitment to excellence throughout the entire game. At times they've pulled it together and played well for a quarter or two, but Brown has found himself frustrated that it doesn't happen earlier in games, or happen for longer. 

He found the same issue in Monday's game after the Knicks were outscored 75-47 in the first half and even after a much tighter second half, the damage had already been done and the Knicks fell 114-97.

"We've gotta lock in. We've gotta do our job for 48 minutes," Brown said (via BASKETMAN). "At halftime we usually do clips and talk about technical x's and o's and all that crap that coaches do and teams do. There was nothing to be said at halftime except 'lock in and do your job."

Brown identified several issues he saw in the first half: points in the paint, fast break points and the Knicks' inability to keep down what Brown described as "hot guys," players on the Mavericks that were having great games. 

Whatever Brown said to his players at halftime certainly worked. 

While the Mavericks had 28 points in the paint in the first half, they had 16 in the second half. The Mavericks had 27 fast break points in the first half and just seven in the second half and Brown was much happier with how the Knicks contained the "hot guys" shot 9-11 from the three point line in the first half and 3-6 in the second half.

Brow didn't name the "hot guys," but based on the numbers they were clearly Klay Thompson and Max Christie, who scored 14 and 26 points respectively while shooting a combined 12-17 from beyond the arc. 

Brown gave credit to his team for pulling together and holding the Mavericks to 39 points in the second half, but if the Knicks want to get out of this pit they can't just have recovery halves after making mistakes, they need to be on top of the game throughout the entirety of it.

Or as Brown said, the Knicks need to "lock in and do their job."