It wasn’t quite Linsanity, but Jeremy Lin did his best to put on a show for the New York Knicks fans at the Madison Square Garden on Monday – the way he so often did last season while wearing the orange and blue.
After hearing mostly cheers – a classy reaction by the fans – when he was introduced as a starting point guard for the Houston Rockets, Lin got comfortable early and attacked the rim at will with little resistance from the Knicks’ defense. He would have his way throughout the night to help the Rockets dispatch the Knicks 109-96 with 22 points on nine-of-15 shooting, four rebounds, eight assists, four turnovers and two steals.
Lin looked forward to getting this game “over with” because it would provide some closure, and he’s right. The two teams don’t meet each other again this season, leaving little reason for the media to discuss any further about what happened between Lin and the Knicks over the summer.
Did New York do the right thing by letting Lin walk, as Jay Williams tweeted? It sure appears to be that way, with Lin struggling through much of this season while Raymond Felton has provided a spark for the team with the best record in the Eastern Conference.
As his latest game would indicate, however, Lin still has plenty of room to grow and it may be too early to determine what the right move may have been in the long run. Either way, if this was his way of putting a closure on his time with the Knicks, he probably couldn’t have scripted it much better.