No matter how hard you tried from courtside, it was impossible to take your eyes off Markquis Nowell.
This was his homecoming weekend in New York, after all, and the little man came up about as big as anyone ever has in the Garden, college or pro.
Despite his listed height of 5-foot-8, Kansas State’s answer to literary license, Nowell came out of Harlem promising himself he’d do everything humanly possible to become New York’s finest. He still has a ways to go to get there, but that isn’t the point.
Nowell believes he can do it, and he knocked out two Hall-of-Fame coaches in Kentucky’s John Calipari and Michigan State’s Tom Izzo — back to back — in his attempt to make you believe it, too.
Saturday night, it didn’t much matter that he failed to book a trip to the Final Four as Kansas State lost 79-76 to Florida Atlantic, the kind of longshot the former Bishop Loughlin point guard has been for most of his basketball life.
Nowell expanded his legend anyway, winning the East Region’s Most Outstanding Player award by delivering 30 points and 12 assists Saturday two nights after his 20-point, 19-assist masterclass against Michigan State in the Sweet 16.
“Nobody knew who Markquis was prior to this tournament,” Nowell said at his locker.
They sure as hell know now.
“Harlem is on top,” he said. “Some people say Harlem died and New York City point guards fell off. But I’m a testimony to how great a New York City point guard can be.”
With a chance to tie the score in the closing seconds Saturday, Nowell took the ball up the left side and waved off the designed screen scheduled to be set by his fellow Harlem product, Ismael Massoud. Nowell remembered that Massoud hits most of his 3-pointers from the right side, and wanted to give his teammate his best chance at success.
Nowell is always thinking. He’s always trying to make the right play for his friends. But after Nowell threw him the ball, Massoud could never get off a shot.
At the buzzer, Nowell put both hands on his head and walked slowly toward the sideline while the Owls celebrated their unfathomable trip to the Final Four. He sat down on the last seat on the bench as teammates and staffers moved to console him. Nowell soon rose and congratulated the victors. He said they grabbed every 50-50 ball there was to be had.
Despite the foul trouble that limited the Wildcats’ leading scorer, Keyontae Johnson, to 18 minutes (“I feel like he got a lot of ticky-tack fouls early on,” Nowell said), the point guard wasn’t making any excuses.
“I feel like they wanted it more,” Nowell said. It was a tough public concession to make.
But even in defeat, Nowell made a lasting impression on those who believe the sport can be dominated only by players of a certain height and length. On the subject of size, there was an interesting piece in The Times the other day about tall people who don’t play basketball, but often get asked if they do. A safe bet says that no stranger has ever asked Markquis Nowell if he plays basketball.
Yet in his magical performance in the overtime victory over Izzo’s Spartans, Nowell played basketball like no college player before him. He set an NCAA Tournament with those 19 assists. He also scored 20 points while former Michigan State stars Steve Smith and Mateen Cleaves were sitting with one of the greatest point guards of all time, Isiah Thomas, imploring the Spartans to cut off Nowell’s passing lanes and force him to finish plays on his own.
No advice or scheme was going to work Thursday night.
“I determine how the game is going to go,” Nowell said beforehand.
On the signature play of the tournament, Nowell showed off his vision and passing skill, which his coach, Jerome Tang, compared to that of Patrick Mahomes and Aaron Rodgers. On an injured ankle, the point guard started the sequence by looking at Thomas in the crowd and mouthing the words, “Watch this.” As he brought the ball across halfcourt, Nowell turned to Tang and engaged in either a real or counterfeit argument over what the Wildcats should now do with the score tied and just more than a minute to go in overtime.
And just like that, after gesturing at his coach in apparent anger, Nowell made eye contact with Johnson. He threw the lob that Johnson’s raised eyebrows had called for, making possible the reverse slam that will go down as one of the more stunning plays in recent NCAA Tournament history.
“I feel like I gave my heart and soul to this game these past couple of games,” Nowell said Saturday night. “I maximized everything I had inside of me to see these guys happy.”
Nowell lost on the scoreboard and won everywhere else, showing undersized underdogs everywhere that heart is far more impactful than height. Thomas had told The Post that Nowell will “absolutely” be a successful NBA player, and the Kansas State star responded by saying, “game recognizes game.”
In the end, Nowell said he just wanted to make his parents proud.
“They always tell me how great I am,” he said, “but I never understood how great I can be.”
He understands now. In the first two Garden appearances of his life, Markquis Nowell made a hometown mark on the city game that will last a lifetime.