He came to the Knicks from the Bulls in a trade amid a summer of controversy last year, a big free agent, and Wednesday he was the big man against the Bulls.
“It feels good,” Jamal Crawford said. “They came off a great season last year, and they’re going to be pretty good again. So it was a big win for us. This one was for [Eddy Curry].”
Yes, it was supposed to be the night for Curry, the former Bulls center’s first appearance against the Bulls since the summer of everyone’s discontent. But Curry tweaked his sore left calf in a shootaround Wednesday and was told to sit.
This time his buddy Crawford, who was the goat last season against the Bulls, came through.
Last season he had a collapse down the stretch with two missed free throws that enabled the Bulls to sweep the Knicks and clinch home-court advantage in the first playoff round as the Knicks faded into the off-season.
This game Crawford hit all 10 of his free throws, including seven in the fourth quarter when he scored 13 points to lead the Knicks to a 109-101 victory with a team-high 28 points.
“That one I took hard,” Crawford said of the late-season meltdown game. “I broke out in hives after that last game, truthfully, I had so much emotion. I wanted to win that game so badly and I missed two free throws. That was so uncharacteristic, so that upset me. That one bothered me.”
This time Crawford, who came off the bench for the Knicks, came down hard on the Bulls during a stunning sequence during which the Bulls didn’t score for almost the first five minutes of the fourth quarter. The stretch cost them an eight-point lead to open the quarter in a game in which they dominated in the first half. The Bulls were outrebounded 11-5 in the period and 38-33 for the game.
“We got in the bonus early,” Crawford said of a parade of Knicks to the free-throw line for a whopping 57 free throws in the game and 25 in the fourth quarter.
It all had Bulls coach Scott Skiles in a frenzy on the bench, the crowd noise even seeming to give Eric Piatkowski a chance in the game when it seemed uncertain if Skiles was yelling “Pike” or “Mike,” the latter for Sweetney.
Piatkowski surprisingly entered the game with a quick lineup on the floor for the Knicks and the game tied 82-82. He made a bad pass, which was picked off by Antonio Davis, and Davis was fouled on a breakaway. After an Andres Nocioni miss, Tyson Chandler hacked Davis to foul out with about eight minutes left. Then Crawford was fouled on a drive by Piatkowski and added a three-pointer to put the Knicks up by eight in an avalanche of misfortune for the Bulls.
It came during a stretch in which the Knicks, soft in the first half, showed a rare flash of defense with two Ben Gordon shots blocked, making it five on him in the last two games despite a good shooting effort.
The teams matched three-guard lineups and spread the floor, but the Bulls showed impatience and frustration.
“It was one pass and a shot after a while [for them],” Crawford said.
After they took the lead, the Knicks kept it with Nocioni and Kirk Hinrich following Chandler to the bench on fouls.
“That’s the best [Crawford] has defended since I’ve been around,” Knicks coach Larry Brown said of the player on whom he has been the hardest. “When we went small we were able to put the ball on the floor and our quickness kept people in front of us a little better and they settled for a lot of jump shots. In the first half, we settled for jump shots and they executed. In the second half, we didn’t settle for jump shots early in the clock and got to the rim a lot and kept them out of transition.”
The Bulls had just three fast-break points in the game after their transition play was effective Tuesday in defeating Orlando at home.
“Jamal was aggressive,” Brown said. “I’m still dying when he takes that 12-foot runner. I wish he’d pull up and shoot a jump shot or take it all the way to the rim. But he was phenomenal. I’ve been hard on him every time we watch a film. I say, `See that, Jamal?'”
This time he saw it, and the Bulls saw too much of him.
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sasmith@tribune.com
