NEW YORK _ Important question for Jeff Hornacek: Have you been waking up to the same song every morning? Was Wednesday's newspaper on your front porch on Friday?
It may be a few months early for Groundhog's Day, but on Friday night, Hornacek's Knicks did a fairly spot-on recreation of their game two days earlier. Again, they played the Timberwolves. Again, they staked an early lead and looked primed to cruise to an easy victory. And again, it disappeared in a frenzied fourth quarter that would have the most even-keeled coach questioning his sanity.
It wasn't quite what it was Wednesday, when Carmelo Anthony's basket with two seconds left saved the win from the brink of oblivion, but it was certainly headed that way. Kyle O'Quinn, playing for the injured Joakim Noah, brought the Knicks back on Friday, but not without a few queasy moments. The Timberwolves made up a 14-point, third-quarter deficit in the fourth and even led by one before the stupefied Knicks put it back together, going on a 9-2 run and winning, 118-114, at Madison Square Garden.
O'Quinn scored 20 points with 13 rebounds and Anthony led the Knicks with 29 points and Derrick Rose had 24. Zach LaVine led the Timberwolves with 23.
The Timberwolves took off on a 12-2 run to start the fourth quarter, and Shabazz Muhammad's dunk tied it at 100 with 8:01 left. The Timberwolves, who feasted on a complete defensive breakdown, took a brief lead a minute later, when LaVine's dunk put them ahead 102-101. O'Quinn's layup with 6:13 to go put the Knicks back up and he hit two free throws a few seconds later to provide the most uncomfortable of cushions. Anthony's breakaway layup with 1:21 left gave the Knicks a six-point lead.
Before that, the story had been Karl-Anthony Towns, but not the way it usually is. Maybe it was O'Quinn, but on Friday night, Towns' seven-foot frame didn't loom as large as it did two days earlier, when he scored 47. Towns was held scoreless for almost the entire first half _ he sank a layup with 1:18 left and two free throws after that (he still finished with 20).
The Knicks (10-9) move over .500 for only the second time this season, and to 4-0 without Noah, whose nagging injuries mean he is being paid well to take a seat. And for the first three quarters, the Knicks didn't seem to miss Courtney Lee (ankle) much, either: They opened the game on a 14-5 run and actually looked well on their way to an easy win.
Anthony, who took 10 minutes to take his first shot Wednesday, had seven points by that mark on Friday. The Timberwolves did manage to cut the Knicks' lead to four on Nemanja Bjelica's 3-pointer with 9:06 left in the second quarter, but Willy Hernangomez hit a layup 40 seconds later and Sasha Vujacic's trey put the Knicks up 39-30. The Knicks took a 10-point lead into the break.
Of course, that was almost all for naught, thanks to the Timberwolves' fourth-quarter run. At the end, though, the Knicks recreated Wednesday in the best way possible: They came out with the win, despite serious late-game missteps. But don't blame Hornacek for wanting to wake up to a different tune tomorrow.
