T.J. McConnell is bringing the ball up the floor. It’s a tie game, 81-81, on the first possession of the fourth quarter in Game 2 of the Eastern Conference Finals. The Pacers have decided to open the final frame with an unrelenting flurry of pick-and-roll action — and New York can’t keep up.

Knicks fans knew. Long before Aaron Nesmith was imbued with infernal fire so that he might defile the Garden, before Tyrese Haliburton’s fiendish prayer of a shot went up, and before that same foul pact guided the ball back down and through the rim as those gathered in attendance gasped in horror,