The people rose and they roared and they were in no hurry to rush to the exits, because these are the nights when Madison Square Garden really can feel like the city’s aorta. These are the fourth-quarter nights when the Knicks remind you why pro basketball is still the core of the city’s sporting soul.
“We were feeding off the crowd,” Tim Hardaway Jr. said, a few moments after this 106-101 victory was complete.
It was Hardaway who hit the biggest shot of the night, a no-doubt-about-it 3-pointer that pushed the lead from one to four with 32 seconds left, that sent the folks into a frenzy, that made it clear the Knicks were going to outlast the Jazz on a night when it seemed certain they would never make it to the finish line.