By TERRY LYONS, Editor of Digital Sports Desk
TRANQUILITY BASE – At approximately 8:30pm (EDT) on Saturday night, the New York Knicks will re-enter the Earth’s atmosphere. They must. They have a game to play.
After performing a miracle of the sporting nature, including the greatest comeback in NBA Finals history which was capped by an impossible dream final sequence and O.G. Anunoby’s incredible tip-in of a Jalen Brunson front rim-rocker three-point field goal attempt, the Knickerbockers have to put their Finals Game 4 victory in the overhead compartment, and must splash down in Texas, maybe somewhere in the Riverwalk of San Antonio.
Re-entering the earth’s atmosphere is hard enough but splashing down in two to 24 feet of water – call it dirty water – stemming from a combination of recycled wastewater, natural groundwater springs or, maybe, at best, storm water run-off.
NASA has nearly perfected the scientific wonder of blasting a rocket ship through the earth’s atmosphere to orbit the big blue planet, or maybe even soar to the Moon or to go where no man has ever gone before. But, NASA’s HQ is about 200 miles East of San Antonio, a straight shot across I-10. On a good day, you can drive it in three hours. San Antone might have iHeart Media but they don’t have NASA.
The Knicks might prefer to land in Houston – near the Johnson Space Center – to play the Rockets. There’d be the revenge factor of 1994 when they lost to Rudy T, Hakeem and company with John Starks’ off the mark shooting in Game 7 of that series. This year, the New Yorkers could handle Türkiye’s Alperen Şengün but, instead, they’re messing with a different brand of basketball, taking on “The Freak of “la République,” Victor Wembanyama, a 22-year old, 7-foot-4 smooth operator of the game, one with moves, footwork beyond belief, defensive presence good enough to win the NBA’s All-Defensive Player of the Year as the youngest to ever accomplish the feat.
Wembanyama is so good, he was the first player in the league to take the All-D Player of the Year in unanimous fashion. At the ripe age of 22, Wembanyama is earning votes as the NBA’s Most Valuable Player. Someday soon, he’ll be known as the best player in the world.
Which brings us back to the exact kind of ship the Knicks’ new masters of jet-propulsion will need to come down from the exhilarating highs of their miracle on 33rd Street victory of Wednesday night to somehow side-step human nature, and the fatigue it inherits, otherwise known as an emotional high the City of New York has never seen before.
Yes, there was Bobby Thomsen’s “Shot Heard ‘Round the World,” but the black & white television signal barely made it to Staten Island, never mind to Glasgow (Scotland) where Thomsen was born. Transistor radio was delivery system of choice back in 1951 when “the Giants won the pennant.”
Yes, there was Willis Reed gimping out of the Madison Square Garden corridor to join his New York Knicks teammates on May 8, 1970 in Game 7 of the 1970 NBA World Championship Series to hit the first two jumpers of the game and propel his club to a 113-99 title-clinching victory. Even Howard Cosell might’ve been lost for words when he uttered, “You exemplify the very best that the human spirit can offer” to the injury-plagued, cortisone injected Reed.
Yes, there was the key play of Super Bowl XLII and an incredible Eli Manning scramble, shaking off defenders to toss a ball that tight end David Tyree somehow caught with his hand and his helmet in the 17-14 NFL Giants title-winning game on February 3, 2008.
Yes, there was Joe Namath’s guarantee for a wictory in Super Bowl III when Namath’s AFC Jets upset the NFC’s Baltimore, 16-7 on January 12, 1969.
Yes, there were the Amazin’ Mets of 1969, 10-games back of the Chicago Cubs in the National League East, who won the division by eight games, upset the favored Atlanta Braves in the NLCS, then – after dropping the first game of the 1969 World Series to the Baltimore Orioles – ran off four in a row, three at Shea Stadium in Queens, to take MLB’s World Championship.
And, yes, there were the New York Rangers who won the NHL’s Stanley Cup after a 54-year drought (1949-1994). NYR captain Mark Messier had willed the team to victory and his moment of raising the Cup might be the only thing to compare to the joy felt by Knicks fans on Wednesday night when they witnessed history and the greatest of comebacks in NBA Finals’ lore.
But, emotional highs are a dangerous villain.
The very San Antonio Spurs the Knicks face might’ve fallen victim to the emotional high of defeating the favored OKC Thunder (May 30, 2026) and blown Game 1 of this 2026 NBA Finals on June 3, when the Spurs led by 14 points with 6:31 left in the third quarter only to lose to New York, 105-95, when the final buzzer sounded on the Spurs’ home floor.
The sound of silence in San Antonio on June 3 and 5th, was quite the opposite of the sonic boom heard at Madison Square Garden on June 10th after New York erased a 29-point deficit.
We just had some experience with a sonic boom as a meteor attempted to enter the Earth’s atmosphere at the speed of 75,000 mph from a height some 40 miles directly over the Commonwealth. The sound created was equal to exploding 300 tons of TNT (and that’s not Turner’s network, but explosives).
It was quite unsettling and it proved what a difficult task NASA faces when our manned USA space ships return their cargo and precious human lives back to safety.
It’s a daunting task to return to Earth, so remember, splashdown for New York’s miracle is Saturday night, June 13, in the Riverwalk of San Antonio. And, remember too, winning three games in the NBA Finals is easy. Winning the fourth game is damn near impossible. But, every season, someone does it. Yes, a Sweet Sixteen victories in a lengthy NBA postseason.
These days of 2026, Space X can return a spacecraft to the launchpad standing upright, as if it’s never even left in the first place. If the Knicks can do so, and clinch the NBA’s coveted Larry O’Brien Trophy and NBA championship, O.G. Anunoby might earn a new nickname – The Original Galileo.