NBA PLAYOFFS : Knicks Put Heat on Pacers : Pro basketball: Ewing scores 25 points to spark 92-82 victory and give Knicks chance to again oust Indiana.

With an intensity born of brink-of-elimination desperation, the New York Knicks on Friday fought, clawed and screamed--at each other.

When they redirected those emotions toward the Indiana Pacers, Larry Brown’s team simply had no chance.

Riding a magnificent performance from center Patrick Ewing, the Knicks went on a 23-6 run in the third quarter and held off a 20-7 response by the Pacers to even their best-of-seven Eastern Conference semifinal series at 3-3 with a 92-82 victory.

Should the Knicks win the seventh game Sunday at Madison Square Garden--home teams have won 20 consecutive seventh games since 1982--they would become the fifth team in NBA history to overcome a 3-1 deficit and win a best-of-seven series, unless Houston does it first today at Phoenix.

Sunday’s winner will advance to the Eastern Conference final starting Tuesday at Orlando.

“This was probably our most intense game all season. We really put it on the line,” said Charles Smith, whose in-your-face antics with teammate Anthony Mason during the second quarter added fire to an already heated situation. “It was very intense. We were just as intense with one another as we were against them.”

Coach Pat Riley indulgently called their animated chat “fussing and feuding” of the kind he has come to expect.

“They’re a great wild bunch and I’m not going to defuse that,” he said.

“We were just jawing a little at each other,” Smith said, “and it just came to a head. We kissed and made up.”

Said Mason: “Yeah, it definitely was hot and heavy. Any time a game is that important, emotions are going to be hot and crazy.”

Reggie Miller and the Pacers weren’t hot. He missed his first six shot and the Pacers hit only 35% from the floor in the first half.

Miller had 15 points in the fourth quarter and finished with 18, but he took only 13 shots.

“When you look at the first half, we were real fortunate to be in the game with the trouble we had,” Brown said. “They came out in the third quarter and made some shots and we had some big turnovers.”

After Smits hit two free throws to give Indiana a 50-46 lead with 10:13 to play in the quarter, Ewing and the Knicks overpowered the Pacers and silenced the Market Square Arena crowd of 16,679.

“The first few games, I wasn’t 100%. I couldn’t move, couldn’t elevate,” said Ewing, whose sore left leg improved enough for him to collect 25 points and 15 rebounds--both game highs. “Tonight, I had a lot of energy.”

Thanks to Miller’s awakening, the Pacers cut a 72-56 Knick lead to 79-76 with 5:32 left in the fourth quarter. But the Knicks weren’t about to let this one get away as they had in Game 4 here last week. Riley, who had pulled Ewing in the fourth quarter after he drew his fifth foul, sent him back in. “It was really time,” Riley said. “The season was there.”

Mason stole a pass in the low post and Starks fed Charles Oakley for a layup that put the Knicks ahead, 81-76. On the Pacers’ possession, Miller was called for traveling, and got a technical foul for slamming the ball down in anger. Oakley hit the technical and Ewing followed with a hook shot that sent the crowd home wondering if they were seeing a repeat of last year’s Eastern Conference final, when the Knicks won Game 6 at Indiana and then won the series at New York.

Brown said the Pacers will have to play a perfect game to win Sunday. Riley agreed that his team had room to improve technically, but his players’ combativeness had his unqualified approval.

“I don’t care what happens Sunday. We’re going in there to win and we want to go on to the next round but this is a team that’s sort of hard not to get attached to,” he said. “To see them come off the mat and give everything, it’s hard not to embrace that.”