Pacers 116, Knicks 103: No one said it’d be easy — only worth it
This is it: why pencils have erasers, why swords have pointy ends, why Chekhov’s gun always fires in Act III. The New York Knicks play a Game 7 tomorrow afternoon at Madison Square Garden, after which they’ll either head to Boston or break till training camp. If the season to date hadn’t already made clear the narrative necessity of this series going the distance, last night’s 116-103 loss in Indianapolis left no doubt. Muss es sein? Es muss sein.
Game 6 started around 8:40 p.m., but one could argue it really began December 30, 2023, the day the Knicks acquired OG Anunoby and Precious Achiuwa for RJ Barrett and Immanuel Quickley. That was the moment the Knicks pushed a bunch of chips to the middle of the table, when they traded being admirable and plucky for being a contender. The standards changed; the timetable quickened. But even that momentous moment has a mother.
Game 6 really started July 1, 2022, when the Knicks signed Jalen Brunson. There’s no historic marker honoring the occasion, no Dave DeBusschere rising in disbelieving joy, no James Dolan throwing in Timofey Mozgov to clinch the deal. The Mecca’s messiahs looked the part: young Patrick Ewing was a taller, more explosive Bill Russell, while Carmelo Anthony played bully ball with balletic footwork and touch. If Brunson is the prince who was promised, the promise came in the small print you find at the bottom of documents, the stuff lawyers hope you won’t bother to read.
Since Brunson’s arrival, the Knicks’ future has neared as its narrowed. “Tomorrow” has been a buzzword to Knicks fans most of this century, a shibboleth, but thanks to this team tomorrow is Game 7. The superstar we waited for is here. The stage is set. And now even the understudies are dropping like flies.
We’re all familiar with the Knicks’ injury list reaching Ramayana lengths these playoffs. We were unfamiliar with Josh Hart’s mortality until he tussled for a rebound with Pascal Siakam and came up holding his abdomen. Core injuries to core players can core a team’s whole season. Hart returned and still gave the team 31 minutes – the man gives Lazarus imposter syndrome. But he didn’t look at all the same, passing up short shots and fast break opps he normally jumps at. Probably because it hurts to jump.
And so the Knicks find themselves where they’ve been for a month, since the playoffs began: shorthanded, but no longshots. They find themselves where they hoped to be when after they won six of their last seven regular-season games to clinch the 2-seed while Milwaukee was crashing and burning and Cleveland was tanking: in a do-or-die Game 7 at MSG, where they’ve won 10 of 12. The two losses both required late-game magic in the form of a game-winner by Shai Gilgeous-Alexander and the Marx Brothers-level slapstick that was the end of Game 5 vs. Philadelphia. Most of the 10 wins have been white-knuckle affairs. The Knicks and their fans won’t care what it looks like Sunday, so long as it ends the way it should.
It should end with the Knicks advancing – if there are any Knicks left to advance once it’s over. Anunoby is out the rest of this series, at least. The Knicks listed Hart as suffering from “abdominal soreness” in their typical understated way; if the Knicks were in charge of the White House’s messaging November 22, 1963, they’d have said President Kennedy had a headache. Hart will play because he’s an indestrucible robot from the future, but even the best machines are a symphony of parts and programming, and Hart’s percussion section is clearly compromised. If he is, so are the Knicks.
“Compromise” comes from the Latin compromittere, referring to two sides in arbitration who “promise together” to accept the decision. These Knicks have earned more trust from their fans than any team in a quarter-century because trust is what happens when actions meet words, and this team that only seems to care about grinding and winning and next-man-up has kept on grinding out Ws behind Julius Randle and OG and Donte and Deuce and Bojan and Mitch and Achiuwa and Alec Burks and all the rest. The team has given the fans everything we could have asked for. They’ve promised to always to give their all, and they have.
Tomorrow the fans have the chance to do what their predecessors are famous for: being an actual, tangible sixth man, roaring and reveling and raising a team on its last legs and abdomens to the series victory. They have the chance to elevate Brunson as much as he’s elevated us, to teach Tyrese Haliburton that guys like Reggie and Mike didn’t crow away from the Garden only to clam up under the bright lights and the pinwheel ceiling. From trading KP to hiring Leon Rose and Tom Thibodeau to playoff tickets being made wildly unaffordable for loyal, blue-collar, often Black and Brown fans who actually support the team in exchange for rich drunk casuals to everything the Knicks have done this year, these Knicks were designed for a single purpose: to win the next game.
Will Hart play? Does Brunson have any miracles left in him? Can the Knicks re-establish their dominance on the glass after surrendering it last night? Could Jericho Sims or Mamadi Diakite write themselves into the pages of history? Will Andrew Nembhard, Aaron Nesmith or Isaiah Jackson be the next Roy Hibbert, Anthony Carter or Bucky Bleeping Dent?
Chekhov’s gun has been loaded and ready to go this whole series, this whole postseason, this whole century, really. Now comes the time for whatever is meant to happen. Erasers erase. Swords stab. Guns fire. Brunson finds a way. Thibs finds a way. The Knicks find a way. Nobody predicted this season from this team. Why should tomorrow be any different? Muss es sein? Es muss sein.
