52 SPORTS ILLUSTRATED | SI.COM
a do-or-die matchup that would either make them the 1994
NBA champions or relegate them to being a colorful footnote
in hoops history, Pat Riley made a comment that still rings
in the ears of one of his closest friends all these years later.
Riley and Dick Butera were standing together inside
the team’s Houston hotel, waiting for an elevator so they
could head to the arena for Game 7 between the Knicks
and Rockets in the NBA Finals. It was then that Riley
heartily grabbed the real estate developer by the shoulder.
“Well, old buddy: I know at least three people are gonna
show up tonight. You, me and John,” Riley said, referring
to shooting guard John Starks.
At the time, Riley’s confidence in Starks’s pulling through
seemed well placed. Following a brutal Game 1, in which
he shot 3-for-18 after flying in from his uncle’s funeral,
the undersized wing had been dominant in five straight
contests, averaging 21 points and seven assists in that span
while drilling 49% of his shots and 45% of his triples. He’d
come through when it mattered most—and made up for an
ineffective Patrick Ewing, who was smothered by league
MVP Hakeem Olajuwon—by notching double-digit scoring
in three consecutive fourth quarters in Games 4, 5 and 6.
Yet when Riley proclaimed that Starks would show up,
he had no idea the swingman hadn’t slept the night before.
Or that he hadn’t slept the two nights before that. From
Sunday night to Wednesday, Starks had been unable to stop
tossing and turning. He usually could f lush failed plays
the moment they ended. But now, the final play of Game 6
wouldn’t stop cycling through his head.
Most of the Knicks felt worn down by the time Game 7
began. Not just physically, although that contest marked
their 25th game of the postseason—at the time the most
in NBA history. But also mentally. The Rockets slumbered
in their own beds for the three nights before the biggest
game of their lives. The Knicks were antsy, camped out
at their hotel, left with nothing but regrets about how
Game 6 ended.“Having to stay there for three days between Game 6
and Game 7, all you’re hearing on TV is ‘Houston, Houston,
Houston.’ I was turning channels like crazy,” backup center
Herb Williams recalls. “We had to sit there for three days
and think about everything. I think Riles was thinking
about having us go back to New York after Game 6 for a
while. I’m not sure why we didn’t do that.”
No one was deeper in thought than Starks, who had a
chance to win the title for New York in Game 6. With 5.5 sec-
onds to go, and Houston up 86–84, he took the inbounds
pass above the arc and got a pick from Ewing. But Olajuwon,
the two-time reigning Defensive Player of the Year, switched
onto Starks, allowing Ewing to roll toward the free throw line.Hours before
the Knicks’
biggest game in
a generation,
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LATE BLOOMER
Starks made his first All-Star team
in 1994—at the age of 28—a season
in which he was second on the Knicks
in scoring and hit 33.5% of his
three-point attempts.