There were a couple of times, even if you weren’t lucky enough to be inside the building, even if you were watching through a TV screen, when it finally felt like basketball. of Madison Square Garden, which is no joke game, and it was like listening to an old tune you haven’t heard in years. All the letters came back to you quickly.
There was a sequence, at the beginning of the game, when Nerlens Noel finished an alley; the crowd roared. There was another, early in the second quarter, when Obi Toppin stole the ball from Draymond Green, ran to the other end and charged in an Alley Burks feed; the crowd thundered, a real thunder, a real noise, which did not come out of a can.
There were a couple of moments there in the fourth, as the Knicks tried to reverse a reverse from 13 and the Warriors suddenly couldn’t hit the water of a boat that the 2,000 men turned into until 1994. , all the way back to 1973, and sang an old chestnut:
“DEEEEE-FENCE!
DEEEEE-FENCE!
DEEEEE-FENCE! ”
That was the good thing. This was the A side of the night, along with Julius Randle’s preamble in front of the crowd, people trying to drown him with the chants of “M!” V! P !! M! V! P !! ”Along with that fourth quarter, when the Knicks got to 97-97, when it looked like they would really tie a bow tonight.
But there was also a B-side. There was the final score: Golden State 114, Knicks 106, Steph Curry finally clearing the parties, as he will, with a couple of dead-clutch blows late. It was the start of the game and the start of the third quarter, when the Knicks looked like they were playing with some ill-fitting shoes.
“We didn’t always match the intensity of the game,” Knicks coach Tom Thibodeau said.
There may have been some uneven trade, at least the Knicks thought so, and that caused Randle to win a second technical foul and the expulsion in the afternoon that supposedly belonged to him, was beginning to end, beginning with his inclusion in the All- Star Game. Ending with him walking down the tunnel to the locker room, the first unprintable songs of the year fall from the garden seats.
“Without shouting,” Randle said on his thumb.
So the 2,000 who made the familiar pilgrimage to the old gym at the top of Penn Station left, as they have often done in recent years, muttering and muttering, wondering where the phenomenal version of Immanuel Quickley (shooting 1-on-5) wondering where RJ Barrett’s much-improved version was (1-for-9, though he got 10 rebounds). But also: energized by a typical Knicks game of this 2020-21 season, especially when they started the defense late. There is no denying that they are trying. Trying it is enough a few nights.
Not just tonight.
In the end, they lost in a second consecutive attempt to balance their .500 record of the season, on a night when they had done so would have felt so appropriate given the environment and mood.
“We have to be a 48-minute team,” Thibodeau said. “Sometimes, if you lose focus against a team like that, you will find problems. You have to be ready. The way we started the game proved it. “
So did the way they finished it. And look: this was the unexpressed contract that Knicks fans signed with this team a few months ago, before any of them could witness it. They understand that there will be nights like this. They seem at peace with the emotional glove that this imperfect team will provide so many nights.
“That was all you could dream of,” said Randle, who had his wife and son in the house, and the mother sent a video message from her home in Dallas, which had its typical star game. home of 25 points, 10 rebounds and seven assists.
“Everything has come to fruition. It was amazing, honestly. Everything I scored, all the goals I wrote when I got to the Knicks, was happening. It was an incredible moment for me and my family. “
On Thursday, the top-scoring kings arrive in the garden and the Knicks will try to make another turn as they bounce back to .500. There will be two thousand fans again, who will surely take every opportunity to strengthen their voice boxes until the middle of the season. Maybe the Knicks can be a 48-minute team on Thursday. It would be a good way to give thanks.