Briefing: June 4
Megan Thee Stallion stans Kevin Knox
Good Morning,
Happy Birthday, Xavier McDaniel!
Howard Eisley, the lone holdover from Jeff Hornacek’s staff, is expected to join the Michigan bench within the next 24 hours, per Brendan Quinn. This will leave an open assistant spot on the Knicks’ bench, should David Fizdale choose to fill it.
Allonzo Trier was seen working out with Stanley Johnson at the Mamba Sports Academy in California.
You can watch Kevin Knox working on his ups at the Mamba Sports Academy here.
Latest Workout Rumblings:
Knicks worked out Markis McDuffie and Phil Booth yesterday, per Mike Vorkunov.
Knicks plan to work out Kerwin Roach, who worked out with the team last summer, today, per Mike Vorkunov.
Knicks have a workout scheduled with Jarrett Culver on Friday, per Steve Popper.
Knicks will interview/workout Tacko Fall on Friday, per Marc Berman.
Duke’s Marques Bolden will also meet with the Knicks on Friday, per Ian Begley.
Florida State’s Terance Mann plans on working out with the Knicks, per Josh Robbins.
R.J. Barrett wants New York because they are picking third. Barrett’s AAU coach Dwayne Washington told The Athletic, “He’ll go anywhere because he’s a winner. He would like to go to New York because New York has No. 3. If Atlanta had three and the Knicks had No. 7, he wouldn’t want to go seven.”
Rapper, Megan Thee Stallion, caused a stir around the Knicks internet by posting this video of herself wearing a Kevin Knox jersey. Knox quickly noticed.
Remembering Larry Johnson’s 4-point play
by Jonathan Macri
You know it's a slow news day when the most interesting Knicks-related research I did in the last 24 hours was finding out who Megan thee Stallion is, learning what she does for a living, and trying to decipher why she has an extra "e" in her middle name.
That being the case, let's use this opportunity to turn back the clock.
Tomorrow is the 20th anniversary of Larry Johnson's 4-point play. It's hard to put into words, even for me, what that shot still means two decades later. To this day, I've never experienced as wide a swing of emotions as I did in the approximately one second between when the shot went up and when it came down through the net. Despair to euphoria in the blink of an eye.
Just how violently the roller coater inside every one of our stomachs turned depended in part on how quickly you processed what was happening. It's impossible to tell with exact precision, but there's an argument to be made that the sound of the whistle preceded the ball leaving Johnson's fingertips by a millisecond, if that. For all intents and purposes though, the two events happened simultaneously.
The human brain is a funny thing. Regardless of how smart we are, the mind is not designed to comprehend multiple inputs of information at the same time. So when the whistle blew as the ball went up, our eyes needed to take a moment to synch up with our ears. This happens faster for some than others. And then there was the matter of the ball still having a chance to go in.
Nowadays, this is an event that we're far more used to. The 3-point revolution has made 4-point plays more of a common occurrence than they used to be, to the point that they no longer carry the shock value they once did. According to NBAMiner, during the 98-99 season, there were 20 completed 4-point plays in the entire league heading into the playoffs. James Harden had that many by himself this year, and 20 other players had at least three 4-spots during the regular season.
As that ball was in the air, the last thing any of us were expecting was for it to go through the net. That made it unique in and of itself. And then you consider the circumstances.
The Knicks weren't down by one or two. In either scenario, as a fan, you're going into that play thinking they still had a chance. But New York was down by three. Best case, you go to overtime. For as in our feelings as we were heading into that possession, no one's emotions were prepared for that. It was like nervously awaiting the birth of your first child, and out they pop with a winning lottery ticket in their hand.
"Oh thank God it's healthy...andwhatthefuckisthatwooooooooo!!!!"
Oh, and this was at home in the Eastern Conference Finals against the team's most bitter rivals in a series tied 1-1. As icing on the cake, they barely even got the ball inbounds without getting it stolen.
So yeah...that shot was kind of a big deal. Was it the biggest shot in Knicks history? Perhaps, although Allan Houston's Game 5 winner vs Miami a few weeks prior has an argument, as does Ewing's Game 7 putback dunk vs Indy five years earlier.
For as amazing as both of those shots were though, nothing in Knicks history can top the in-the-moment delirium of the 4-point play. Even today, 20 years later, it's impossible to watch the clip of the Garden crowd exploding in unison without getting chills.
So as we prepare to celebrate the official 20th anniversary tomorrow, we're calling for people to share their own memories and experiences of that magical shot. I'll be sending out a tweet later today to call for submissions, but if you want to tweet or DM me @JCMacriNBA, we're going to put the best ones in tomorrow's newsletter.
Two decades old...and I can remember it like it was yesterday. What a moment.
Remember when…
June 4, 1993: Knicks playoff run ends, as they fall in Chicago 96-88 in Game 6 of the Eastern Conference Finals. Patrick Ewing scores a game-high 26 points (including 13 in the fourth) and grabs 13 rebounds. Knicks lose four straight to close out the series.
Thanks for reading, talk to you tomorrow!