Camby's blowup doesn't fit the new Knicks' character

Sporting News, The, Jan 29, 2001 by Dave D'Alessandro

You might have seen what Marcus Camby did last week, but you had to actually hear what happened to fully appreciate the impact of the moment. What came across on TV was fairly pedestrian stuff, and it was nothing new to most of us. We saw a professional athlete, the victim of Danny Ferry's cheap shot, filled with muted thunder, dabbing at his eye. When he realized it was filled with blood, he lost it.

Jeff Van Gundy took it upon himself to do something extremely brave and stupid: He took the charge for a team that leads the league in that department and had his face bashed in for his trouble.

Still, that wasn't why the league came down so hard on Camby, who happens to be a terrific kid and the Knicks MVP this season. The five-game suspension was partly a result of the noise he created with that single act. As you may know, it all happened during a holiday matinee, and Madison Square Garden was filled in large part by the under-8 set. For most, this was their first experience with violence, and it resulted in a ghastly chorus of shrieks of terror. Interesting irony, that: Here was Camby, a seemingly gentle and soft-hearted fellow, who walks scores of kids to class on the first day of school to promote attendance, scaring the bajeebers out of roughly 12,000 of them.

But what made this scene so uncommonly absurd is that this isn't who the Knicks are anymore.

They are neither physical nor physically imposing; they are neither prone to emotional excesses nor quick to the punch. They are firm in constitution as well as resolution, but they always will choose brains over brawn. And the more you watch them, the more you like them.

At the start of the week, the Knicks had won 10 of 11 and had the second-best road record in the league (12-6), which would seem to suggest a mental toughness. They also were 10-5 against the West, which would seem to suggest they don't share the East's general inferiority complex.

But physical toughness? They don't show it. And they don't need it. That's not to say that they are not aggressive or resourceful.

They are also a great paradox: The great defensive teams in the past were configured differently--notably, the Knicks of recent vintage, those of Oakley, Mason, Ewing and Harper, who could turn your skeleton into a fine powder. These Knicks have a center who refuses to call himself one, forwards who stand 6-7 and 6-5, and they have a glaring weakness for yielding 3-pointers. They have no individual who is a versatile defender (other than maybe Larry Johnson) or one whom you could call physical (except for Kurt Thomas). But the Knicks are a team of superb help defenders, and they do guard the dribble and keep the ball out of the paint.

They succeed because of discipline, Van Gundy's attention to detail, a refusal to get beat upcourt and an esprit de corps. Efforts against Portland and San Antonio last week were especially remarkable: If the Knicks expected a weakness at the dawn of the Post-Ewing Era, it would be post defense, but the Blazers and Spurs pounded it with poor results. They were blown out of the Garden just 48 hours apart.

Maybe Camby's five-game suspension, which will keep him out until February 1 against the 76ers, affects the momentum that has been building for a month. But the Knicks seem to find answers even under the worst of circumstances--witness their 7-1 record without Camby, who was injured twice earlier thie season--and the team is showing more dimensions now.

Such as? You always hesitate to say it with this group, but here goes: The Knicks can score, even in transition. It's just that the tear-inducing tedium of their sets (post it, swing it, take a jumper) makes you wonder whether they want to. Allan Houston is a world class shooter, and Latrell Sprewell, though he is in a shooting slump, seems better off now that he is liberated from the point guard duty he had during Charlie Ward's 19-game absence. Glen Rice, after some early gripes about floor time, is averaging. 13 points on 10 shots per game with the promise of more to come should a sore foot heal. When just two of these three have it going, the Knicks' offense is a study in balance.

All of this has less to do with coaching than with execution, but Van Gundy has his team where no one really thought it would be. He is not as (ahem) flamboyant as his act of intercession might suggest, and he still spends most of his waking hours holed up and muttering to himself about blown coverages. But his style is an incremental accumulation of small details, which, laid end to end, make a compelling case for deliberate offense, gang-rebounding, sacrifice--and mostly defense.

Houston puts it best: "We don't make things up on defense. We know what we want to do, we talk. Defense is a lot about effort, but it's also a lot about communication and being on the same page."

So far, this approach has broken a 50-year-old record for the most consecutive sub-100 defensive games (32 and counting as the week began), and they're likely to make a run at several other records. Something tells you the Knicks will get by with this group and this style. They'll get by even without Camby or anyone having to show opponents how tough they can be.