Spurs Come Up Big Against the Knicks

That’s the way the tough cookies crumble.

Reality bites and Wednesday night, it took a big chomp out of the New York Knicks. They’re now down 3-1, giving up four inches a man on the frontline, and the duration of this best-of-seven series is more in question than the outcome.

“Size does matter,” said the Knicks’ Jeff Van Gundy, the coach who doesn’t have any, in his first public concession of the NBA finals. “It really does.”

Gee, no kidding.

This was an impossible dream from the get-go, even if it never seemed to occur to the Knicks, who played the Spurs tough twice in San Antonio, beat them here in Game 3, and chased them deep into crunch time Wednesday.

With 5:24 left, Charlie Ward missed a free throw that would have brought the Knicks back from a nine-point deficit in the fourth quarter. Then at the other end, David Robinson, who is 7 feet 1, flashed into the pivot, got the ball, found 6-5 Larry Johnson on him, and flipped a little jump hook over him.

The next time down, the 6-11 Duncan made an easy jump hook over the still 6-5 Johnson.

Now Johnson, a small forward back when everybody was healthy, wasn’t an explosive jumper, even before he hurt his knee in the Indiana series. Van Gundy keeps playing him big minutes, because he’s still the lone Knick post-up hope. Wednesday, Johnson scored five points and missed six of eight shots. In the finals, he has 31 points, having missed 28 of 39 shots.

Said Van Gundy, resignedly: “That’s how it is.”

That was how desperate it was.

Well, it was fun while it lasted, when the dream lived and breathed, if only one believed . . .

Before the Knicks broke through in Game 3, Gotham measured its passion. Games 1 and 2 drew TV ratings only in the 20s in New York. The night before Game 3, WFAN talk-show host Chris “Mad Dog” Russo said the thing everybody wanted to talk about was Brett Hull’s skate in the crease.

After Game 3, however, everyone was back on the bandwagon. On WFAN, leather-lunged fans wondered why Tim Duncan was getting the Michael Jordan treatment from the referees.

The mad circus whirled on. The New York Post suggested Patrick Ewing was making secret preparations to play. The Daily News replied Ewing did, indeed, fly to Washington, D.C., but not to consult another doctor, to see his kids on Father’s Day.

Johnson granted interviews before Game 4, rather than let the league fine him again, treating everyone to a tour of his fun-ride psyche, at one point characterizing the Knicks as “rebellious slaves.”

Now we now what that L-sign he was making stands for: Losing it.

Wednesday night, the Knicks passed out “I Still Believe” T-shirts, before Van Gundy sent out his lineup with Johnson, Marcus Camby and Latrell Sprewell on the frontline and Allan Houston and Ward in the backcourt--essentially three guards and two small forwards.

So the Spurs hit them right between the eyes, scoring on 10 of their first 11 possessions.

And the Kicks came right back to take the lead before the first quarter ended. At halftime, Ward, whom Knicks fans routinely deride as “the worst starting guard in the NBA,” had 10 points, having made all four of his shots, including two three-pointers, with three assists and three steals, and the Knicks were within four.

Then the Spurs clocked them over the head again with a 9-0 run to start the third quarter, taking a 13-point lead . . .

And the Knicks rallied again, closing to within 81-80 midway through the fourth quarter, when Ward missed that last free throw, and Robinson and Duncan took turns stepping on Johnson in the hole.

There goes another rebellion.

All that remains now is for the Spurs to end this thing formally, and they have three chances, of which the last two would be on their home floor.

Robinson conceded, “We think about it a little bit.”

For his part, Coach Gregg Popovich said, “This is new territory for me. I don’t know what the hell I’m doing here. I just figure we have to go play on Friday.”

If Van Gundy’s subdued postgame mood is any indication, the Knicks will have some job getting themselves ready to play Game 5. Of course, if recent history is any guide, the Knicks will be ready, even if no one really believes in impossible dreams around here any more.