Positive, we could be a little stuffed with ourselves generally. We're New York. We're New Yorkers. That’s who we're. That’s what we do. Others can chortle in regards to the title Madison Sq. Backyard has coined for itself — one all of us willingly subscribe to — however that doesn’t trouble me one bit. Does it trouble you?
Is it actually “The World’s Most Well-known Area?”
The Palestra is on Line 1. The Roman Colosseum is asking long-distance, on Line 2 (is lengthy distance even a factor anymore? Perhaps it’s on What’s App). Phog Allen Fieldhouse wish to have a phrase. So would the ghosts of Boston Backyard.
Right here’s the factor that issues: When there is a vital basketball recreation being performed on the fifth flooring at Penn Plaza, with the group baying and the noise bouncing merrily off the pinwheel roof, there isn't any higher sporting place to be. It's the solely sporting palace we now have left in Manhattan. It's the metropolis recreation within the metropolis’s gymnasium.
So the Knicks need to honor that Friday evening.
If the Knicks need New York to consider that they're legit, they should observe up an impressed efficiency towards the Grizzlies in Memphis on Wednesday evening with a full 48 minutes of effort, vitality and execution Friday evening. They should make the Pistons really feel most unwelcome on the house opener.
They actually, actually have to win it.
And never by a deuce on the horn, both.
“We have to defend our house court docket,” Tom Thibodeau stated. “For all good groups, it begins with taking part in properly by yourself flooring. That’s a should.”
Sadly, for Thibodeau and for Knicks followers, that statement was given final October after an unsettling 110-104 loss to the Magic in final season’s third recreation. It could be onerous to recollect however the Knicks started 2021-22 with a thunderous splash, beating the eventual conference-champ Celtics on opening evening on the Backyard, then throttling the Magic in Orlando by 25 factors.
However two days later, on a sleepy Sunday night, the Magic blitzed the Knicks 36-24 within the fourth quarter and left a crowd some 2,000 fewer than capability dazed and confused. What they didn’t but know — couldn’t know — was that will be the institution of a troubling pattern for final yr’s Knicks.
They'd end 17-24 on the Backyard, an inexcusable quantity, particularly as a result of approach too lots of these house losses have been no-show efforts towards lesser groups. They misplaced 5 in a row at house as soon as, proper across the All-Star break. They have been truly a good 20-21 on the street, which makes the house document each puzzling and infuriating.
“There’s no excuse for this,” Thibodeau stated after an unsettling 127-123 time beyond regulation loss to Oklahoma Metropolis.
“Now we have to be higher,” he lamented after a 119-101 pasting by the Cavaliers.
And perhaps the worst indignity of all occurred Feb. 16. The Knicks blasted the Nets 38-18 within the first quarter. They led 87-73 after three. They misplaced 111-106. And that was when the Nets have been within the midst of their 3-17 midseason free fall.
Thibodeau principally simply shook his head after that one.
No person expects the Knicks to channel the ’86 Celtics and go 40-1 on the Backyard. However they should be consultant there. They actually have to play with extra consistency Friday than they did Wednesday.
The Backyard doesn't need to boo them; the Backyard desires to embrace them. New York doesn’t need to write them off; it desires to offer the sort of cozy, snug house it all the time has when the Knicks present a motive.
Friday gives that likelihood.
“I’m excited,” stated Jalen Brunson, who as a child attended dozens of Knicks video games and as a collegian dazzled there because the core of a Villanova mini-dynasty, and who will make his official house debut. “It’s going to be a enjoyable evening. We'd like a win, that’s all I care about.”
That’s the mantra the Knicks have to embrace — “we'd like a win, that’s all I care about” — particularly at house, particularly on nights when the Backyard so badly desires to salute them. Friday is such an evening. The Knicks have to honor the everlasting religion of their fan base. It begins in recreation one on the Backyard. It has to.
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