The cord is officially cut Thursday night. For real, and for good, the lasting stain of Phil Jackson will be removed from the Knicks. It was two days shy of a year ago that Jackson conducted his final official duties with the Knicks, drafting Frank Ntilikina with the No. 8 pick, declining to trade Kristaps Porzingis.
“We have a lot ahead of us,” Jackson said that night, and of course when he uttered those words he had no idea that he had only a week ahead of him before he would be exiled.
That sentence remains intact, though, even if the front-office structure has been turned upside down in 51 weeks.