Against All Odds

These Knicks don't know when to quit.

Good morning?

No…

It’s a GREAT morning.

Game 76: Knicks 120, Kings 109

I will not curb my enthusiasm for this basketball team.

In a New York minute…

The emotional hit of the Julius Randle news was too much, and New York, after months of fighting, scrapping and clawing their way to wins against all odds, simply had nothing left in the tank. Sacramento went up 35-20 after one, and that was that.

Except it wasn’t.

That’s because these Knicks take the script they’re supposed to follow and throw it directly in the trash. Using a 16-2 run in the second quarter, an 11-0 run in the third quarter, and a 13-0 run in the fourth quarter, New York not only overcame their big early deficit, but held a double digit advantage for the final 5:21 of the game. By the end, the Kings were a shell of the version that appeared in the first quarter. The Knicks had taken their will.

Say it with me now: as good of a win as they’ve had all season.

Three Things

1. “He is not human…he is like a piece of iron”

Forgive the cross-sport movie reference, but I didn’t know how else to start off today’s newsletter than by referencing America’s favorite underdog athlete.

But with all due respect to Rocky Balboa, the way this Knicks team continues to respond to challenges is far more unlikely than any movie I’ve ever seen.

Mere hours after finding out their 3-time All-Star power forward would be gone for the rest of the season, and after being down by 21 points following a 9-for-13 start from behind the arc for the Kings, New York had every reason to throw in the towel. If this were a heavyweight fight, one of the participants would have been seeing stars by the beginning of the fourth round.

And yet…and yet, and yet, and yet…

They refuse to give in.

How? By upping the intensity on defense to postseason levels, and by trusting that the threes would start falling (which they did, at a 50 percent clip following a 1-for-6 start).

Why? Because mules are less stubborn than their head coach, and because of that, his team refuses to believe any game is ever really over.

There is no world where this version of the Knicks was supposed to win this game. Or a handful of other games they’ve won over the past two months, for that matter.

But they do, somehow, some way, for the simple reason that they refuse to give in to expectations.

That is the mark of a champion, and even if this year’s team likely won’t be raising any trophies, they will go 15 rounds with every opponent they face.

Good luck surviving until the final bell.