NEW YORK — Wednesday night’s frenzied Game 4 of the NBA Finals could have played out much differently for the New York Knicks, and Josh Hart would have been seen as the goat.
No, not the good iteration of goat, either.
The Knicks had gotten 99% up the mountain, overturning a 29-point deficit and a 20-point fourth-quarter to get within one of the Spurs at 104-103 with two minutes left in the game.
With the roof about to blow off Madison Square Garden, Hart picked off an errant pass from De’Aaron Fox and came in alone for what should have been the easiest go-ahead basket of his life to give the Knicks their first lead of the night. But it appeared he got stuck between deciding whether to dunk it or lay it in, and his two-handed attempt to place it into the basket clanged off the back rim and out with 1:57 to go, leaving the home crowd stunned.
New York did manage to take the lead 35 seconds later when Jalen Brunson’s tough floater fell, but Hart then fouled Stephon Castle under the basket with 30.3 seconds to go. The Spurs guard hit both free throws to restore a slim lead for the visitors, but Anunoby saved the day with his game-winning tip-in with 1.2 seconds left to pull off the largest NBA Finals comeback ever.
“This game was crazy,” Hart said. “I got a special shoutout for OG because he saved me, at least for this game, a lifetime of regret.”
“It’s pretty cool [that he said that], but we’re a team, a brotherhood,” Anunoby said. “We have each other’s backs, that’s how it goes sometimes, and we would all do the same for each other.”
The 32-year-old forward has been inconsistent during these Finals. He scored just three points in Game 1 but hauled in 14 rebounds, then went scoreless in Game 2 and was limited by foul trouble. He bounced back to drop 16 points in Game 3’s loss, then posted six points with eight rebounds, six assists, and two steals.
But the Knicks’ depth has covered up any of those shortcomings, and Anunoby has carried the torch particularly over the last two games. He scored 28 in Game 3, then dropped 33 on 10-of-15 shooting and 7-of-9 from three-point range on Wednesday night.
“He’s been amazing since he got here,” Hart said of his teammate. “This whole playoff run, he’s been amazing on both sides of the ball. He’s a winning player, and he made a winning play.”
But the euphoria of such a dramatic win had to be pushed to the side rather quickly. The Knicks did their best to keep their nose to the grindstone and pivot their focus to Game 5 on Saturday night in San Antonio, where they could clinch their first NBA title in 53 years.
“At the end of the day, we gotta go out there and finish the job,” Hart said. “We can’t be complacent or happy about this because they’re going to come out on Saturday in their spot, their fans, and that’s going to be a battle.”
