In ’06-07, Isiah Thomas’s New York Knicks strung together
one of the strangest seasons in recent memory.
Winners of just 33 games, they weren’t exactly good, but what they
lacked in success was more than made up for in dramatics. Though the record shows they were blown out
on more than a few occasions, it seemed at the time as if every single game was
decided at the buzzer. As it turns out,
this is not entirely a case of selective memory on my part --- the Knicks
really were involved in a preponderance of close games. In Memphis, they opened the season with a
triple-overtime victory; In Charlotte, they closed it with a buzzer-beating tip
in; In between, during one mid-December stretch, they played six overtimes in
five games. Of the full 82, a total of
20 were decided by three points or fewer.
One such barnburner took place in Los Angeles on the 13th of February. Trailing by a point with about 20 ticks on the clock, the Knicks put the ball in the hands of Stephon Marbury. Marbury maneuvered into the lane and kicked out an unguarded Quentin Richardson. Q’s triple was off the mark, but the rebound took a fortuitous (word to Clyde) bounce into the hands of David Lee, allowing for one more Knickerbocker attempt. Never hesitant to make a bold play under pressure, Jamal Crawford simply did what he’d done so many times that season: serve up a lob for Eddy Curry to devour like a triple bacon cheeseburger with light axle grease.
One such barnburner took place in Los Angeles on the 13th of February. Trailing by a point with about 20 ticks on the clock, the Knicks put the ball in the hands of Stephon Marbury. Marbury maneuvered into the lane and kicked out an unguarded Quentin Richardson. Q’s triple was off the mark, but the rebound took a fortuitous (word to Clyde) bounce into the hands of David Lee, allowing for one more Knickerbocker attempt. Never hesitant to make a bold play under pressure, Jamal Crawford simply did what he’d done so many times that season: serve up a lob for Eddy Curry to devour like a triple bacon cheeseburger with light axle grease.
Curry scored 19 points --- precisely his season average ---
in this thriller. Having been good for
25+ in six of his previous nine, including a 27-point effort in a victory over
Dwight Howard’s Magic, Curry had been playing phenomenally coming into this
game. Well, playing phenomenally on offense, at least.
But seriously, Eddy was stupid athletic and supremely coordinated for a guy eight feet tall and six hundred pounds. He tooled on the likes of Dwight Howard, Andrew Bogut, Kendrick Perkins, and Shaquille O’Neal that season. Insignificant as it all ultimately was, it was entertaining as hell. Just look at the way he straight beasted Perkins at the very end of my video mix. There’s little doubt in my mind that that dunk would’ve toppled any pre-Shaq era basket stanchion.
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