Rockets, Knicks Punch the Lights Out

The New York Knicks beat the Rockets, 79-75, in an exhibition game at Houston that featured four first-period ejections for fighting and a power failure.

Houston’s Charles Barkley and the Knicks’ Charles Oakley went at it only 2:54 into the game and were tossed. Then Kevin Willis of the Rockets and New York’s Patrick Ewing were thrown out at the 7:35 mark after a heated scuffle.

With 2:25 to go in the opening period, many of the lights and most of the power in The Summit went dark. It took almost 30 minutes for the electricity to be restored. Officials at Houston Lighting & Power Co. blamed the outage on stormy weather that was hitting Houston all day.

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Rocket starting point guard Brent Price could be out for as long as four months after breaking his left arm and undergoing surgery.

Price, a free-agent acquisition expected to give the Rockets an outside shooting threat, was injured diving for a loose ball during an exhibition Thursday night in San Antonio.