This was a laugher. The Knicks, who already withstood an 11-0 Sacramento run, were cruising in the third quarter, up 19 points. Everybody was contributing and the Knicks were home where recently they may not have been invincible, but pretty darn good. Yup, laugher.
But the joke was nearly on them. The Kings, in the midst of a road trip that is great for frequent flyer miles but rough on the body and psyche, ran off 18 straight points, 11 from the foul line.
“Just had to tough our way through it,” said Derrick Rose.
So the tough Knicks got going Sunday and fashioned a fourth quarter that, while hardly a masterpiece, sure was better than the Mona Lisa with a mustache that the third quarter resembled at the Garden. When all the ugliness subsided, the Knicks were 106-98 winners over Sacramento and two games above .500 after their eighth victory in their last nine home games.
“It’s been happening lately. I feel like our third quarters have to be better if we’re going to be a great team,” said Brandon Jennings, who scored 13 of his 19 points in the final 12 minutes — he had five huge points at the end of the third quarter and then dropped in eight in the fourth.
“We have to quit harping on the fact that we have leads and that we want to get that killer instinct,” said coach Jeff Hornacek, who before the game addressed the fact the Knicks have leads and want to get that killer instinct.
Eerie, huh?
“We’ll just ignore it. Maybe it gets in their heads and they start thinking about it,” Hornacek said.
OK, so just take the good with what at times was really, really bad but ultimately came out just fine.
“It’s a line drive in the scorebook, right?” Hornacek said.
The Knicks (11-9) had leads of 21 and 20 before this became a nail-biter. The Knicks were rolling, playing just about anybody who had a uniform, including Rose (20 points), Carmelo Anthony (20 points), Jennings and Kristaps Porzingis, who finished with 15 points (plus 14 rebounds) despite a rough 6-of-18 shooting night.
The lead eventually dwindled to a mere one a few times as no one told the Kings they were out of it because guys like Cousins (36 points, 12 rebounds in 43:25, including the entire second half), Rudy Gay (22 points) and Darren Collison (13 points) wouldn’t go away. But Cousins seemed gassed at the end when the Knicks put it away.
“Of course I was tired. I played the whole second half,” Cousins said.
“They went to him late. They went to him all game actually,” said Kyle O’Quinn, who returned to the Knicks bench as Joakim Noah was back from a two-game absence because of an ankle injury and started— though Courtney Lee sat a second straight game with an ankle sprain. “You could tell he was probably a little tired.”
At 6:51 of the third, Rose drove successfully to put the Knicks up, 72-53. Then it was pretty much disaster.
“If I had the answer, we wouldn’t be in that type of game. It takes experiencing it and just learning from it,” Rose said.
The Knicks went 5:11 without scoring. After that Rose drive, they didn’t score again until O’Quinn scored off a Jennings assist. During the interim, the Knicks missed six straight shots, committed five turnovers.
“Had to step back a little bit, slow it down, figure out what we want to run,” Anthony said. “We did that in the fourth quarter. Once we regrouped, we were good.”
It wasn’t until an Anthony 3-pointer 3:24 from the end and two Jennings free throws at 2:54 that the Knicks had breathing room. The Kings played Hack-a-Noah late and the Knicks center bricked four straight free throws but the Kings could not capitalize. Anthony’s jumper with 35.5 seconds left made it 103-98 and the crowd exhaled.
“That’s the next step for our team — to figure out how we’re going to not close games out but extend leads. We’ll become a much better team when we’re able to do that,” Anthony said.
Maybe not as interesting though.