IT’S a new series for the same old reasons. After an eye-opening Game 1, the Knicks strapped on their blindfolds once again.
Allan Houston looked for nobody else, stumbled into six turnovers, and went 4-for-13 in Game 2. Patrick Ewing, after scoring nine, boarding 15, rejecting four in an opener the Knicks won by 20, resumed dragging his 36-year-old butt across the lane, putting up what are no longer his best-percentage shots, helping slow the offense to a crawl in a contest the Knicks lost by 10.
Anybody can see how much better the Knicks are when they move the ball. Anybody, apparently, but them. Ewing, it is true, made half of his 14 shots Monday night, only two more than he took Saturday. But that’s a vantage point of a tree, not the forest in which he seems doomed to wander lost for his declining years.
The Players Association president who has to be left out of negotiations so a deal can be struck to save the season is hurt at Dave Checketts’ suggestions that he must adapt his role, answers media questions about the same subject only with a “you must be from New York.” Ewing keeps an open mind like he sees the open man. Custer was a great warrior, too.
It will be hopeless, both beating the Heat this series, and making an orderly transition to a winning future, unless The Big Fella stops thinking small.
The Knicks have a significant advantage on the perimeter against the thin and banged-up Heat, need to retake control of the series tonight by getting Houston, not Ewing, off early. Houston killed the Heat last year and used Latrell Sprewell in Game 1 to pin Miami in a deadly crossfire. In this series, Houston won’t be worn down so much by Dan Majerle as by anxiety, which the Knicks have to ease by getting him shots.
“Allan was into being one-on-one instead of trying to read the situation,” assistant coach Don Chaney said yesterday. “I think [tonight] you’ll see a different guy.
“Everyone is saying the Heat played great defense. I’ve seen them play much more aggressively than that. We helped them with bad decisions, held the ball. Our whole team wanted to do it one-on-one.
“Being aggressive and being aware are two different things. You have to pass to the open guy. That was the difference in Game 1. We got better as [Game 2] went along. But even our post-up guys held the ball too long.”
Especially, the Knicks post-up guys held the ball too long.
Ewing clutches it like he clutches the misguided notion that he needs to score 20 points for the Knicks to win. What they require from The Big Fella now are the 30 rebounds he has totaled over two games, the help defense he is able to provide a lot better than he can guard Alonzo Mourning one-on-one on a bad Achilles tendon, plus offensive contributions that are best made facing the basket.
Ewing’s mantra – pass only out of the double team – is as worn as his body, which is unnecessarily being pushed for 35 minutes a game while Chris Dudley, who can bang on Mourning, sits. Larry Johnson, a more efficient post presence than Ewing, winds up being under-used as well. Johnson twists, ducks, almost never gets his shot blocked and, unlike Ewing, will dish to the teammate waiting for the uncontested dunk, facilitating the ball movement the Knicks have enjoyed every time they have teased us with competence.
“That’s been our problem, why Miami finished up here [as top seed] and we finished down there [No. 8],” said Chaney. “They were more consistent than we were.”
The Heat did it without vastly superior talent, which leaves the Eastern Conference champs, hobbled by Tim Hardaway’s cranky knee, in another fight for their lives against the Knicks, this time apparently minus anybody who can shoot off the dribble. Terry Porter, 36, was more effective than both Sprewell and Houston on Monday night because teammates made Porter that way.
“I think Hardaway is hurting, and that’s part of why he took only five shots in Game 2,” said Chaney. “But he’s also smart enough to know if you involve other guys you have the best chance. The Heat doesn’t win when Mourning scores big.”
When Ewing thinks he has to, the Knicks don’t either, not against good teams. But 14 seasons into a career without a championship, he shows no signs of understanding how his insecurity will become his legacy as much as 24,000 points and 10,000 rebounds.
Ewing moans that the Knicks want to get rid of him when it’s his refusal to grasp reality that will make them feel that way.
As the player he needs to be for the Knicks to contend, Ewing has a few good years left. As the player he still believes himself to be, Ewing may have already outlived his usefulness.
Bad as his left leg may be, it doesn’t hold him back nearly as much as his attitude.