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Knicks edge Magic

New York's late surge sinks Orlando, which fails on last-second shot.

By BRUCE LOWITT

© St. Petersburg Times, published November 22, 2000

[AP photo] Orlando's Bo Outlaw drives for the basket as New York's Glen Rice tries to knock the ball away during the first quarter of the Magic's 85-84 loss at home.

ORLANDO -- The idea was to throw the ball in, hold it, force the Knicks to commit a foul and win the game. Instead, the Magic threw away the ball and the game in a shocking 1.9 seconds, continuing a slide that has players all but talking to themselves.

A 16-point Magic lead in the first quarter slowly evaporated, and it vanished when Darrell Armstrong threw away a messed-up inbounds pass with 14.2 seconds to play Tuesday night. New York's Erick Strickland grabbed the ball and passed to Chris Childs, whose layup with 12.3 seconds remaining gave the Knicks their first and only lead of the game and an 85-84 victory.

"We had every break in this game that you can use," Magic coach Doc Rivers said. "Every single one."

But 19 turnovers -- especially the last one -- did the Magic in.

The Knicks went into the game second in team defense, allowing an average of 84.7 points per game. They left with their third victory in a row and the seventh in their past eight games in Orlando.

"This team needs to win a game for their psyche," Rivers said after the Magic lost its third consecutive game and fifth of its past six. "If we had won a game before this one, this game would have been a blowout because they would have been loose.

"When you drop several games in a row, you start trying to hang on. I thought that was more of it than anything. We just got real tentative."

The Magic mess that ended with Childs' basket really began after Latrell Sprewell of the Knicks hit an apparent tying three-point shot with 23.7 seconds to play. It was disallowed because New York had called timeout as he was about to launch the shot.

Instead, Sprewell drove past Bo Outlaw for an uncontested layup that left the Magic ahead 84-83 with 18.3 seconds remaining. It gave Sprewell 22 points, sharing team-high honors with Kurt Thomas. Tracy McGrady had 25 for the Magic.

"I thought we gave that basket way too easy," Rivers said. "Bo was in great position, and I think Bo was really concerned about fouling, which you really shouldn't be. So what if you foul him? Make him hit the free throw."

Still, all the Magic had to do was hold on to the ball. It couldn't even do that. After a timeout and various substitutions, Armstrong took McGrady's inbounds pass and tried to throw the ball back to McGrady. Instead, Childs wound up with the ball and the game in his hands.

Travis Knight and Childs double-teamed McGrady on the inbounds play, "and Strick came in and got a hand on it," Childs said. "When I got it, I knew I had to get to the basket quick. Darrell was trying to block the angle."

"We wanted Darrell Armstrong to come to the ball and get it," Rivers said. "He's our best free-throw shooter, and we just wanted him to hold it. They had to foul. ... For whatever reason, Darrell decided to get rid of it. By getting rid of it, obviously it was a turnover."

Had Armstrong's pass made it to McGrady, the Knicks would have wound up with the ball -- but not the layup. McGrady was still standing out of bounds.

The Magic could still win with a basket. But in the remaining 12.3 seconds, Armstrong missed a driving layup, McGrady missed an attempted tip-in and, after a timeout with 2.3 seconds left, McGrady missed a 14-foot jump shot and Pat Garrity shot an air ball trying for a layup with 0.3 seconds left.

The crowd of 14,673 was the first non-sellout for a Knicks game in the 23 they have played in Orlando since the inception of the Magic.

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