Knicks 121, Wizards 105: The 4-dimensional sadness of the Washington Basketball Team
What goes up — the Knicks — keeps on popping. What goes down — the Wizards — keeps on dropping.
Saturday night, the Knicks beat the Washington Wizards 121-105, their fourth win in a row, including both ends of a mid-Atlantic back-to-back and three wins in four days. New York hasn’t just been winning. They been sonning, tied or ahead the last 117 minutes they’ve played, covering the Bulls, 76ers and Wizards. Julius Randle led the way with 39 points, as he and Jalen Brunson both topped 30 for the second consecutive game.
After the game, asked about the challenge of defending Randle, Washington forward Deni Avdija said, “For me, he’s not that tough to guard. He’s probably – he’s aggressive. He picks his spots. And he’s trying to score, honestly. Big guy. Going in the lane. Getting fouls. That’s about it.”
It seems an odd response by Avdija, given that the only thing that kept Randle from scoring 40 was his own sense of contentedness. It’s possible Avdija was a little punch drunk: Randle, Brunson and OG Anunoby combined to make seven of 11 shots Deni defended. Maybe he couldn’t keep straight who beat him, and how. If he’s a little loopy, he comes by it honestly.
A lot of people struggle to picture the fourth dimension. The Wizards make it easy: just imagine depth, endlessly repeating, layer after layer of sadness. Last night’s loss makes it four in a row. The Knicks have had six losing streaks of 4+ games in four seasons under Tom Thibodeau. The Wizards are on their fourth such streak of a season we’re not even halfway through. Take the wide-view if you like, it’s no better: Washington’s dropped eight of nine, 15 of 18, 28 of 33.
By no means am I gleeful or gloating over this history. If anything, as a Knick fan I can’t help but feel for a historically supportive fan base getting dragged through another hopeless epoch. To put it in blue-and-orange terms: imagine tomorrow Randle, Brunson and Thibodeau all decided to retire. Imagine James Dolan going into a Miss Havisham-like depression, firing Leon Rose and letting Steve Mills steer the ship for the next 20 years. Imagine they’re eerily similar to what the prior 20 were mostly like, i.e. a lotta losing. Then, in 2045, after they’ve lost their fourth game in a row (and eight of nine, 15 of 18 and 28 of 33), a game they were down 20 at the half and trailed all 48 minutes, their longest-tenured player, after getting torched, claims it’s “not that tough” to stop someone he recently and demonstrably could not stop. You’d literally have to double the longest, darkest stretch of Knick history to match where the Bullets/Wizards stand today.
The high point in their franchise history had to be when the defending champion Bullets won Game 1 of the 1979 Finals against Seattle, a rematch of the ‘78 Finals that Washington won. Seattle trailed by 18 in the fourth quarter but used a defensive press to come all the way back and tie the game with 25 seconds left. Ed Rush whistled Dennis Johnson for a foul on Larry Wright with no time left on the game clock, leaving the Sonics apoplectic.
“Why don’t they just award the championship to Washington?” tutted Sylvia Schulman, wife of Sonics’ owner Sam Schulman. Impossible to imagine – someone thinking the basketball gods smiled upon Washington! 45 years since and the franchise, from Baltimore to the District of Columbia and soon to northern Virginia, has won but five first-round series since. I wonder, if she were alive to see where they stand today, what Schulman would think.
As for the Knicks, their next game is Tuesday, a rare home contest against young Portland, after which they’ll head out for two more road games, after which they’ll have 26 home games to 17 away. This was their eighth back-to-back in their first 36 games, meaning 44% of their games so far have been part of a back-to-back. They have only five such sets the rest of the season. Enjoy these days. The next ice age always arrives quicker than you think.
