NBA

Knicks must find a way to steal victory in Indy

INDIANAPOLIS — All they had to do was win one game on the road, and they would have been champions. All John Starks had to do was shoot a 3 over Hakeem Olajuwon at the end of Game 6 of the 1994 NBA Finals at the Summit, and they might have been champions. All Pat Riley had to do was sit Starks once he started clanging everything in Game 7, and they might have been champions.

These Knicks need to be Road Warriors now, tonight, in a Game 4 they are already telling themselves is a Game 7, because it is never too early to adopt a Game 7 mentality, especially when you are staring at the possibility of returning to the Garden 48 minutes from extinction. Because you only get so many chances to define who you are and what you believe you can be, and they can vanish as quickly as Linsanity if you fail your gut check, if you lose the game you must win after surrendering homecourt advantage.

J.R. Smith and Kenyon Martin were in sick bay quarantine at their hotel yesterday, Iman Shumpert has a sore knee and Tyson Chandler has come down with the Hibbert flu. But it is time for the Knicks to show up as a team again anyway. A team that can score the ball and move the ball and make sure Carmelo Anthony sees it in the fourth quarter and shoot the 3. A team that can push the pace and assert its manhood around the boards. A team that can follow the defensive gameplan and play to win.

Because since becoming the first Knicks team to win a playoff series in 13 years, they have been both the Sicks and the Bickerbockers, struggling to find the selflessness and individual sacrifice that is imperative against a bigger, younger and so far hungrier team that plays the right way.

Will the Real Knicks Please Stand Up? They vow they will.

“Without a doubt. I’d be shocked if we came out the same way,” Steve Novak said.

Novak has a chance to be an X-Factor tonight, with Smith a gametime decision again. The back spasms that have sabotaged Novak’s postseason are gone. He has played 4:55 and 1:53 in Games 2 and 3. He has missed his two 3s.

“I felt like I had a good rhythm playing against Boston, and then I had [the] back thing,” Novak said. “Playoffs, and the rotations and that kind of thing, it’s such a rhythm and it’s such a trust factor, and there’s really not time to just say, ‘Hey, see if this works for a few minutes.’ Every possession is so important so, to me, I think that’s what kind of happened, a comfort level where Coach [Mike Woodson] wasn’t as willing to put me in maybe. But I’ve stayed ready, and obviously, the playoffs are what NBA players play for. … I just want to be out there and help the team and obviously I think I can bring something that we need right now.”

The champion 1969-70 Knicks won Game 2 of the Eastern Semis in Baltimore and Game 7 at the Garden; Game 4 of the Eastern Finals in Milwaukee and Game 5 at the Garden; Game 3 of the NBA Finals in Los Angeles and Game 7 at the Garden.

The champion 1972-73 Knicks won Game 3 in Baltimore in the Eastern Conference semifinals and took a 3-0 series lead before losing Game 4 and Game 5 at the Garden; won Game 3 of the Eastern Conference finals in Boston and Game 7 in Boston; won Game 2 of the NBA Finals in Los Angeles, and Game 5 there.

“Playing one game not as well as we think we should have isn’t going to ruin us,” Novak said. “We believe we’re a better team than we’ve showed, and we just have to come out and prove it.”

They have to prove it tonight inside Bankers Life Fieldhouse, where Hoosiers proudly hold up signs that read: Hicks Beat Knicks. Where the Pacers are 4-0 in the playoffs.

“The fans are crazy, they’re yelling and all that,” Novak said, “but at the end of the day, there’s five guys out there on the court, and if you’re working together and you’re all on the same page, you can win on the road, at home, anywhere. I think when we’ve lost our focus, it’s when we’ve got in trouble.”

Will the Real Knicks Please Stand Up?