You always kinda knew this Knicks season would come down to Mike Bibby. A tale as mad as this would need one last plot twist to make it hit home.
Bibby starts at point guard on Wednesday night in Game Five against the Heat, the result of 70 games of point guard attrition that recalls trench warfare in its wholesale destruction. It has claimed everyone but Bibby and Toney Douglas, whose role seems to be that of shellshocked witness to the carnage who has been left too affected to join the fight.
There was no point in the course of this season when you would have felt comfortable with Bibby as the team's starting point guard, but that just means it makes sense that he's part of the starting lineup for a mission to save this particular season.
The Heat aren't particularly frightened by Bibby, even after he hit two threes during Sunday's win, and even felt that their former teammate needed a reminder about the recent past.
"Yeah, I know a little bit about Mike," Dwyane Wade said, presumably while laughing inside about stealing Bibby's shoe during Game Five. "I know Mike has made more shots in this series than he made all last year. Send that to Mike."
Not very nice, but pretty close to factual. Bibby is a big reason to doubt that the Knicks can extend their season a little longer, but he's not the only one.
The Heat are likely to have a better shooting night, the Knicks offense still relies heavily on the erratic (to put it mildly) J.R. Smith and there's the sticky wicket of the Heat putting a better team on the floor than the Knicks put on the floor. You know all that.
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You also know the way the Knicks can make it a game. The Carmelo Anthony-Amar'e Stoudemire show wasn't a one night only affair, the defense continues to look like one of Tyson Chandler's creation and a little bit of luck.
Tall odds, to be sure. In happier news, they're no taller than they were on Sunday.
Lightning doesn't strike twice, but the Knicks showed Sunday that there's a way for them to win. It might take a lot of pieces falling into exactly the right places, but it exists and it's well past time to agree that counting on anything more than the game happening is unwise.
In a season where Bibby can find his way back into a starting lineup, absolutely anything can happen.
Josh Alper is a writer living in New York City. You can follow him on Twitter and he is also a contributor to Pro Football Talk.
