Give Knicks president Phil Jackson credit for this debacle, for his choice words riling up LeBron James and snapping Carmelo Anthony’s 12-day surge. In the end, Anthony, too, was riled up over Jackson.
James would not answer any questions about Jackson before Wednesday’s showdown and did his talking — and perhaps glaring — on the court.
Perhaps spurred by Jackson recently calling his management team “a posse,’’ James wrecked the Garden, attacking the rim with a vengeance in 32 minutes of dominance as the Cavaliers humiliated the Knicks 126-94 to end their four-game winning streak.
The King James freight train racked up 25 points on just 10 shots. He logged seven assists and six rebounds, shooting 7-of-10. After a couple of early buckets, James looked up into the stands in the vicinity of where Jackson sits. The Zen Master was flanked by Knicks legend Bill Bradley and team adviser Clarence Gaines.
“I’m motivated by my love of the game, by the process, by my kids being able to watch me on TV,’’ James said.
On the flip side of James’ gem, Anthony laid an egg on the day Jackson’s remarks on CBS Sports Network created a stir. Jackson depicted Anthony as holding onto the ball too long, disrupting the triangle offense’s flow.
Anthony answered with a season-low eight points, shooting 4-of-9 from the field, and offering up bad body language in the second half when the Knicks fell behind by 34 points.
Worse, Anthony uncharacteristically nearly ended his postgame press conference when the topic of Jackson’s critique got raised, as he started to walk away.
“C’mon. Thank you. Sorry, man,’’ Anthony said. “I don’t want to answer those questions.”
When asked if it was unwise for Jackson to nitpick at him during their winning streak, Anthony said angrily, “I don’t even know what was said. I don’t even want to talk about that. I want to stay away from that at this point. My focus is on my teammates and winning. Whatever Phil said, he said.”
Anthony was already looking toward the team’s five-game Western trip after he was a team-worst minus-31 and committed three turnovers in being outclassed by James (plus-32).
“We want to put this game behind us,’’ Anthony said. “It was overall a bad night. I’m not going to get into specifics. We want to chalk this one up as a tough, bad night and get ready for the road trip ahead of us.”
The Garden emptied out in the fourth quarter as the Knicks fell to 0-2 against the club they could face in the first round or second round of the playoffs, losing by a combined 61 points.
“We did a great job on Carmelo, flying around, helping one another,’’ Cavaliers coach Tyronn Lue said.
The Knicks fell behind 17 points against the fast-paced defending champions just 7:30 into the game.
“We didn’t have the same energy they did,” coach Jeff Hornacek said. “They’re quicker and stronger than we are. I don’t know. You look at our team we are not the big strong team. We have to do it with hustle and energy. … It looked like we were the same as the first game of the season.”
The Knicks’ lone excuse is they were missing point guard Derrick Rose (back spasms) and Brandon Jennings was sloppy early when the team got in an early hole. The Cavaliers turned Knicks’ miscues into fast breaks and Kevin Love (21 points) and Kyrie Irving (28 points) took advantage in the wire-to-wire rout that dropped the Knicks to 12-10.
“Start of the game they scored three of the first four times,’’ Hornacek said. “They came out knowing we had a game [Tuesday] night and they wanted to attack us in the paint and they did.’’
Late in the first half, James came flying down the lane like a runaway train and every Knick seemed to shy away as he threw down a monster flush. Then James walked a few steps into the baseline seats for emphasis.
“It’s definitely embarrassing getting blown out on national television, nobody wants to get blown out on national TV,’’ Jennings said.
Though Anthony was off-kilter — his final shot an airball — Kristaps Porzingis also continued his recent shooting yips — going 5-of-15 for 12 points and just three rebounds.
Anthony was never a factor coming off his season-high 35 points in Miami and has struggled on the second nights of back-to-backs. In the first half, James blocked one of his friend’s shots inside. James also posted up Anthony in one sequence and sank a tough, high-arcing fall-away baseline jumper.
“Credit to them — they played unbelievable and it’s really hard to stop,’’ Porzingis said.