Knicks-Pacers Is a Big Step Up, but It’s Only Best of the Least

Meanwhile, in the consolation bracket . . .

The Indiana Pacers and New York Knicks are competing for the honor of being the underdog in the finals, which is the Eastern Conference’s fate in a day when the best teams are in the West, along with the entire All-NBA first team (figure Shaquille O’Neal, Tim Duncan, Kevin Garnett, Gary Payton, Jason Kidd).

Of course, it’s still entertaining, now that the annual Knick-Heat Mud-Wrestling Tournament is out of the way.

Miami and New York embody bitter rivalry and worse basketball. The Knicks and Pacers embody rivalry and theater--Reggie Miller exchanging choke signs with Spike Lee, the Knicks-Hicks motif--and the teams occasionally score 90 or--gasp!--100, the Pacers being to the land east of the Mississippi in the new millennium what Showtime was in the ‘80s, only slower.

Miller kicked off the festivities before the series started, announcing that after all these years, he still hated the Knicks.

As a news flash, this was like learning the sun rises in the east, but it set the tone.

The New York Daily News ran a cartoon on its back page of a hayseed character with all his possessions tied down atop a jalopy, with the headline:

“Here Come the Hicks.”

The more staid Indianapolis Star, which is run by Dan Quayle’s family, riposted with a sardonic headline over the lead story on the front page that read:

“We ain’t cultured as them.”

The Knicks-Hicks line is thought to have originated in a New York tabloid headline several years ago. The tabs may no longer be able to start actual shooting wars, as they did at the turn of the last century, but a little ersatz cultural conflict is still possible.

The series is going about as expected, if you aren’t from New York, where they still consider the Knicks an elite team (let’s face it, at the prices they charge, they’d better be), and missed the fact they were out on their feet after having to rally from a 3-2 deficit against Miami.

The Pacers blew the Knicks out in Game 1. Patrick Ewing got hurt in Game 2. So far, everything was right on schedule.

The Knicks bamboozled the Pacers with that Disappearing Patrick trick last spring. In Knick lore, the Lost Center is such a standard, their big guys must have it written into their contracts: You’ll go down in the playoffs, allowing your teammates to arise without you, after which you make a dramatic reentry, a la Willis Reed in ’70. . . .

The reoccurrence of this pattern could only be the reason that TNT’s announcers, discounting the simple explanation that the broken-down Ewing had just hurt himself--again--speculated it was actually a “psychological ploy.”

TNT’s flacks even went so far as to issue a news release, shamelessly announcing that the network had scooped the world, since Ewing had told Kenny Smith about his foot injury the day before. This would be rich, even if true: Network pays hundreds of millions of dollars to televise and co-promote the event, purchasing special access to the participants, then puts on its journalism hat and starts breaking stories.

Under the headline, “TNT’s Coverage of Patrick Ewing’s Foot Injury,” TNT announced, on its own behalf:

“TNT thoroughly covered his injury and speculated on whether this was a psychological ploy. Once he re-injured his foot, TNT reported immediately that he would not return.”

After the game, Ewing said this was a new injury, so there went Smith’s scoop. On the other hand, Kenny and John Thompson are thought to be leading candidates for the New Jersey Nets’ coach and general manager jobs and may not have to worry about the vagaries of journalism much longer.

In a surprise, at least in New York, the Pacers won Game 2, so even though the Knicks came back to win Game 3 without Ewing, they’re still in trouble.

A quick KO of New York would suggest Indiana isn’t as lame as it looked a month ago, wheezing in with 56 wins, 11 games behind the Lakers, despite playing an easier schedule of Eastern teams.

Since escaping the Milwaukee Bucks on Travis Best’s late shot in Game 5 in the first round, the Pacers have been on a roll, with the 34-year-old Miller playing some of the best ball of his career, with the cold-blooded Jalen Rose giving them a No. 2 scorer, and a roster with eight players who shot 36% or better on three-pointers this season.

Heaven knows what happened to their peers.

For years, East general managers talked about gearing their rebuilding programs to Michael Jordan’s retirement. Then Jordan retired and no one was rebuilt.

The Knicks have cheated Father Time, maintaining their status as the hottest ticket in town five years after Pat Riley left. (A New York tabloid columnist who told his desk he wanted to cover today’s Yankeee-Red Sox game, with Pedro Martinez going against Roger Clemens, was told the paper was already full with Knick stuff.) Unfortunately, they’re ordinary without Ewing, who’s 37, and seems intent on popping every fiber in his body in his unending quest.

Miami lacks firepower, is capped for another year and has won one playoff series--this spring’s first-rounder against Detroit--since the Bulls polished off the Heat in a five-game Eastern finals in 1997.

Detroit cast its fate with whip-smart/mercurial Doug Collins, who cast his fate with Brian Williams, who drove everyone nuts for a season, disappointed as Bison Dele for another season, then retired, by which time the Pistons were well into post-Collins depression, which will end with Grant Hill leaving, this summer or next.

Orlando was done when it let O’Neal go in 1996, it just didn’t get the news for a while.

Boston threw itself into the maelstrom when it hired Rick Pitino in ‘97, even if it seemed like a good idea at the time.

Cleveland spent the cap money it had saved for years on Shawn Kemp, who was coming off his turbulent years in Seattle, went east and developed a bad case of the munchies.

After giving Larry Johnson an absurd raise in 1994, making it impossible to re-sign Alonzo Mourning in 1995, Charlotte became a way station, with Vlade Divac, Matt Geiger, Glen Rice (and Eddie Jones?) passing through.

Toronto looked as if it had a chance to be a comer with Vince Carter, but Coach Butch Carter went bonkers last month and Tracy McGrady is thought to be on his way out of town.

NBA officials keep noting these things are cyclical. Whoever comes out of the East has to last six games in the finals or the bottom falls out of the TV ratings (see: last spring), so they’d better hope the East recycles itself a lot faster than it has been.

FACES AND FIGURES

Here’s a new role for Riley: tragic loser. Riles was so devastated by his third annual loss to the Knicks, even hard-nosed Gotham reporters who fenced with him for years felt bad for him. “This was the worst, the worst in my 37 years,” Riley said. “Because of the group. Because of how much this group cared. Choking in the [Boston] Garden [with the Lakers in the 1984 finals], winning our first 11 playoff games and then getting swept by the Pistons [in the 1989 finals, after Byron Scott and Magic Johnson pulled hamstrings], it didn’t feel as bad as this. You don’t learn anything from this other than pain. . . . The fans, like us, are probably a little embittered. They saw a team that had a huge, huge, huge, huge, huge heart but came up short. Do that three years in a row, it gets old.”

Riley says he still won’t break up his nucleus. “The next time this team is stripped down and rebuilt, I won’t be coaching it,” he said. Translation: He must be thinking of retiring because someone is going to have to strip this team down and rebuild it in a year. But for the moment, capped and with little to trade, Riley has few moves available, is expected to take Tim Hardaway back on a one-year deal and may even sign Isaiah Rider. “I would consider it, with certain conditions,” Riley said of Rider. “You just never know. I believe people can change and somewhere they really do see the light and they see their career passing right in front of them.”

Speculation is increasing in Philadelphia that Coach Larry Brown will trade Allen Iverson if he can get a top young player--like the Clippers’ Lamar Odom-- for him. Brown is mum. “We need to make changes,” he said, “but I’m not about to get into that right now.”

Coaching derby: Atlanta General Manager Pete Babcock surprised everyone by signing University of Illinois Coach Lon Kruger, whom the pros have eyed for years. Why Kruger was interested is a mystery. The Hawks are teetering on a precipice, at the beginning of a rebuilding program, with 34-year-old Dikembe Mutombo a year from free agency. . . .

New buzz on the pre-draft circuit: Kenyon Martin may be as short as 6 feet 7 1/2. General managers still like him, though. If New Jersey goes for 7-foot Chris Mihm with the first pick, Vancouver is expected to snap Martin up at No. 2.