It didn’t take much imagination to figure out what those last two minutes of the third quarter would have felt, sounded, looked like, were. If you remember what Madison Square Garden will be when the Knicks not only play well, but the fans there believe they have an interest in playing well …
Yes. You know. Do you remember. Intellectually, you knew the yard was empty on Wednesday night, but when the Knicks turned 73-68 to 78-75 higher, as they finished a 10-2 run that felt like it had been pulled from the archives of the ’90s, you could almost heard the pleas rain from the cheap seats, all the way to the court.
“DEEEEE- FENSE! DEEEEE- FENSE!”
While Kevin Knox blocked a shot, while Austin Rivers made a bargain, while RJ Barrett hit a house to underscore everything with 8.1 seconds to go in the quarter, you could evoke the swirling, swirling, echoing sound that would try the Jazz chase away the court, all the way to the bus. These moments in the garden, the best moments, you swear you can see the momentum for the home team.
“It’s such a shame we can’t let our fans play on this,” Julius Randle later said after the Knicks drilled Utah 112-100 – surpassing Jazz by 30 points after seeing a 52-34 lead. . late in the second quarter.
Randle would have given the clients something to get good and hoarse about by handing in what becomes his routine nighttime stat: 30 points, 16 rebounds, seven assists, plus-25 rating. Later, of course, it would be Rivers, who went on to be a phenomenal fourth quarter, scoring 14 consecutive runs to turn a 96-96 draw into a 110-100 lead and topple four consecutive threes.
By then it would have felt like the garden was about to collapse on its foundation. You get that a few times a year when you get a team like this, a team that gets the attention of the believers like this during these first eight games. Watching the Knicks bench go crazy – Immanuel Quickley and Barrett looking gleefully and cheering during their warm-ups – hinted what it might have been like.
“I know the yard would rock,” Randle said. “We all signed up for that.”
What Knicks fans have signed up for – what they craved – is a team that looks like this. Every night there is something different to enjoy. For the past two games, the Knicks fell into big holes – 15 in Atlanta on Monday, 18 against the Jazz on Wednesday – and both times they figured out not only how to turn a blowout into a nail biter, but also how to win both. . spell.
“The NBA is a long game,” said coach Tom Thibodeau. ‘You can make up ground quickly. No pipeline is safe and no shortage is impossible to bridge. “
Rivers said, “Boys had a sense of urgency. They started talking to each other and said, “Let’s track them down point by point.” We knew we didn’t need a home run, let’s just play basketball, and then everyone started having fun, fighting, one thing led to another and then it was ball game again. “
It was a ball game again, and then it was a stick-and-move fourth quarter, the Jazz trying to keep their legs back-to-back on the second half (after smoking in Brooklyn on Tuesday night), the Knicks in hoping that their own legs would survive the eight-man rotation caused by injuries in the early season.
And that’s the amazing thing about this team: you could almost understand when the players leaned on eager, begging crowds so early in the season to get them through. But no matter how much you want to imagine all of that as a fan, the truth of the players is this: it’s like playing in an open gym in high school, no one is watching except each other and a few scattered people coming from the cafeteria. the biolab.
You know what you miss.
But they also know what they are missing.
“I keep trying to imagine it,” said Rivers, who finished in 32 minutes with 23 points. “I can imagine what it was like when I played against them. The fans here have so much energy, I can’t wait. It will happen. Hopefully we’ll get people back here along the line. This is the best place to play basketball and everyone knows it. “
He shook his head.
“Those lights go down, the dark stands …
“There is no such thing.”
Yes. You know. Do you remember.