We all saw and heard over the past month, did we ever, saw how deeply people still care about the Knicks around here, in this time when the Knicks finally fell short of making it back to the Finals but mattered as much over the past month as they ever had in New York.
And all those who do care about the Knicks, and even those who don’t, will always talk about the end of Game 1, when the Knicks where ahead of the Pacers by 14 with under three minutes left and still ahead nine with under a minute was left and lost. Did they ever.
Looking back, that moment does feel like Freddie Freeman’s grand slam to end Game 1 of the last World Series, a shot from which the Yankees never recovered; feels like Kirk Gibson’s Game 1 walk-off in 1988 against the A’s, who never recovered. But guess what? The Yankees could have come back if they were good enough. The A’s could have done the same thing. So could the Knicks.
They weren’t good enough. That means they weren’t good enough this time. But they are getting better, and they are getting closer.
The Pacers got knocked out of the ring in the conference finals a year ago. Now here they are. I believe the Knicks are on the same progression, whether the Pacers are in their way again next year. Is it a sure thing? Of course not.
But this is a sure thing as we close the books on the 2024-25 Knicks season:
The Curse of Reggie is still very much in full force around here.
Reggie Miller. That Reggie. Theirs, not ours.
And it wasn’t just the ghost of No. 31 hovering over this series, he was sitting right there at courtside, part of the last “NBA on TNT” games we’re ever going to get. To make things worse at the very end, there he was, front and center when the trophies got handed out after the Knicks were in the locker room and already into next season.
Curse of Reggie. It was 30 years ago exactly, a Sunday afternoon at the Garden, when Reggie Miller scored eight points in the last 8.9 seconds of Game 1 and the Pacers stole that one by a basket. Those Knicks never fully recovered, even though they were ultimately able to push the thing to seven games, Game 7 back at the Garden, another bloody basketball Sunday for the home team. You know what happened, at the bitter end. The doors on both sides of the lane opened wide for Patrick Ewing and he was alone in front of the basket. Then he missed the finger roll that would have extended the Knicks season into overtime.
In 2013, it was Knicks vs. Pacers again, Eastern Conference semis. Knicks had homecourt advantage again after winning 54 games.
So another Game 1 at the Garden. Knicks lost. Never recovered.
There was another Game 6 that year in Indianapolis, and for a lot of the night it looked like the Knicks might push that series back to the Garden for another Game 7.
But then in a huge moment in the fourth quarter Carmelo Anthony – remember him? – drove down the right baseline and went up looking to throw one down. Only it was Roy Hibbert stuffing ‘Melo and making you think he’d stuff the Knicks in that moment. Curses and foiled again and all that.
A year after last year’s Knicks-Pacers series we’re still talking about how everybody on the Knicks except Willis Reed was hurt by the time the two teams got to Game 7. Except? Except that series never should have gotten to Game 7. The Knicks were all set up to be 3-0 up after Game 3 before Andrew Nembhard was the one making a crazy Reggie 3-pointer, the kind of shot Aaron Nesmith made down the stretch in Game 1 this time.
So the Pacers won Game 3 last year. You know the rest of it, the wounded Knicks getting rolled by the Pacers in Game 7 the way they got rolled at Gainbridge Fieldhouse Saturday night. Curse of Reggie, just not the ghost, because the guy was right there in a 3-piece suit. Of course it was three.
Did the Knicks once get him and the Pacers back good in ’99? They did. They did it because it was Larry Johnson just not making a 3-pointer when the Knicks were on their way to the Finals, he made a 4-pointer.
It’s still as famous a shot in Knicks history as Tyrese Haliburton’s shot at the end of regulation in Game 1 will always be for the Pacers. So much history with these two teams, all the way back to Reggie and Spike and all that jazz in the 90s, all the way to 2000, when the Pacers once again kept the Knicks — another wounded Knicks team — from going to the Finals. Now the two teams make more history, in what was the most entertaining series of these NBA playoffs by a lot.
Knicks weren’t good enough this time, certainly not in the biggest moments of the series. Didn’t defend well enough, weren’t nearly fast enough, turned the ball over so much it finally made you dizzy by the second half on Saturday night, the way the Knicks looked dizzy themselves chasing the Pacers around.
And with all that? Knick fans, certainly the young ones old enough to remember the last great time for them in the 90s, loved this team. Loved it deeply as they watched it make its run. Those fans have a perfect right to think that things will only get better when Jalen Brunson and Karl-Anthony Towns get a second season of playing together. Brunson and Towns just need more help, that’s obvious. It’s up to Leon Rose to get it for them. Like now.
But for now? Curse of Reggie still in place. But maybe for the last time.
