Knicks’ finest hour when it mattered most erased any doubts

The final Boston gasp was a half-hearted 3 lofted by Payton Pritchard, three seconds to go, but by now the celebration had officially commenced. By now, a few thousand of the faithful inside Madison Square Garden had started chanting “Knicks! In! Five!” and the rest of them were just screaming as loud and as long as they could, most of it the most wonderful kind of nonsensical gibberish.

The ball ricocheted off the rim, settled into Mitchell Robinson’s arms, and there was a rumor that the final buzzer went off, but we’ll have to take your word for it. Nobody heard the buzzer. Nobody could hear themselves think. Nobody was much in a mood to leave. They could all wait for the next train.

A night like this is for savoring. A night like this is for treasuring.

“Coming out of halftime we knew we had to really bring it,” Josh Hart would say, soon after the Knicks had wrapped up this satisfying, gratifying 121-113 schooling of the Celtics, “and that’s what we did.”