ATLANTA -
Nate Robinson was finally liberated from
Mike D'Antoni's doghouse Friday night and already is the
Knicks' leading candidate for Player of the Decade.
Robinson, benched for 14 straight games, returned with a vengeance, scoring a season-high 41 points as the Knicks rallied for a dramatic 112-108 overtime victory over the Hawks.
"Good things happen to people who wait," Robinson said.
Robinson, who hadn't played since Dec. 1 against
Phoenix, which led to his agent asking the Knicks for a trade, made an astonishing 18 of 24 shots in 38 minutes. He scored 21 of the Knicks' last 25 points, and personally outscored Atlanta 11-9 in overtime.
"He showed a lot of character," D'Antoni said. "He hung in there, took the medicine and did a heck of a job."
That was as close as D'Antoni would come to saying his goal was to teach the hyperactive guard a lesson by benching him.
"I can't see what would have happened if I didn't do it," D'Antoni said when asked if he had any regrets over his decision to keep Robinson out of action for a full month. "When I did it, we were struggling and then we had the best month we've had here in eight years. Would we have had a better month? I don't know that. We're going forward. We're not looking back now."
The Knicks (13-20) were 9-5 with Robinson on the bench, but had lost three of their last four before Friday night. Robinson refused to criticize D'Antoni but when asked what message the coach was trying to send him over the last several weeks, Robinson replied: "I have no idea. I've just been waiting patiently."
It was also telling that Robinson thanked everyone he could possibly think of as if he had just won the Oscar for Best Actor. That list included God, his mother, his family, the city of
Seattle, Knicks fans, his teammates, former teammates, the training staff and his agent. The one name missing was D'Antoni's.
"It wasn't that I was trying to go out there and prove a point (to D'Antoni)," Robinson said. "I just played the game of basketball. The only way I know how to play it is at my speed."
Robinson's first step was too much for Atlanta, which got 28points from
Joe Johnson and 24 from
Josh Smith, while
Al Horford finished with 22 points and 19 rebounds. The Hawks led by as many as 15 points in the fourth quarter and were up by 14 with nine minutes left.
Other than Robinson,
Wilson Chandler was the only other Knick at the top of his game as he finished with 24 points and 17 rebounds.
David Lee and
Chris Duhon both struggled, and with
Jonathan Bender sidelined with a leg injury, D'Antoni was running out of reasons not to play Robinson.
All signs pointed toward Robinson seeing his first action in a month even though D'Antoni sounded less than enthused about the prospects of playing the diminutive guard.
"We need a little bit of offense and he can do that but we don't want to lose what we had," D'Antoni said before the game.
They got more than a little bit, as the 5-9 guard responded with his best game as a Knick. With the Hawks up 20-11, D'Antoni finally reinserted Robinson with three minutes left in the first quarter, and Robinson was nothing short of spectacular. In overtime, he converted an improbable scoop shot as he was fouled. The next possession resulted in a long three-pointer.
D'Antoni called it "pent-up emotion," and sure enough, when Robinson was on the floor the Knicks outscored Atlanta 97-79. Plus, the Knicks won and Robinson is back in the rotation for now.
"We need to focus on winning and he knows that," D'Antoni said. "It's hard to get into everything, but thank goodness the new year brought a new solution.
"I'm not going to belabor the point whether he was buried or whatever. It is what it is. I'm trying to do what's best. We had a great month and now maybe we can have a better January."
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