Josh Hart Plays Knicks' Hero in Relief

"I never really cared, because it was kind of my decision. I was comfortable with it," Hart said of his lineup status, per Botte.

"This was a conversation that we had, that I’ve had before,” Hart added. “Actually I mentioned, I talked to a couple of people about it before Game 6 [against Boston], I was struggling with the matchup of [Celtics center] Luke Kornet, and wasn’t able to really figure that out."

"Game 6 I had a pretty good game. But it was something that I’ve had in the back of my mind and I’ve always been willing to do. Down [2-0], especially with how Mitch played last game, that was something that we had to do.”

To Hart's point, he put up a triple-double in that clinching victory over the Celtics, becoming the first New Yorker to do so in a playoff game since Walt "Clyde" Frazier. However, slow starts plagued the Knicks in the first two stanzas of the latest get-together with the Pacers, leading the Knicks to engaged in a near-full-on roster clearance sale. In addition to the Hart/Robinson switcheroo, the Knicks also granted lengthy outings to Landry Shamet and Delon Wright, who were seemingly long-exiled from the mainstream proceedings.

The lineup's fresh start provided a fresh Hart: while Robinson took care of early affairs and Karl-Anthony Towns handled matters on the scoreboard, Hart did the metropolitan dirty work to cut the Pacers' series lead in half.

The self-described "15th man, third man, sixth man, whatever" pulled in five rebounds while playing the whole fourth, the last sealing the deal while the Knicks were up four with just about two seconds left. Though Hart did not try a shot from the field during the dozen, he was one of the main attractions in the Knicks' fourth quarter free throw parade, sinking 6-of-6 to secure the vital victory.

If the Knicks win seven more games before next month lets out, they'll go down in basketball immortality as NBA champions. If and when that happens, Hart says that observers will merely list the contributors, rather than sort them by minutes.

“It was funny, everyone was saying things to me. Guys were texting me on other teams. I’m like, brah, I don’t care. I don’t care if I start. I don’t care if I play 20 minutes. If we win, we win," Hart said, per Fred Katz of The Athletic. "Whoever won the championship five years ago, you have no idea who the starters are. You know that those guys won and they have that camaraderie and that connection for life."

"It doesn’t matter how many points you score. It doesn’t matter how many minutes you play. It doesn’t matter if you start. It depends on if you win. And at the end of the day, that’s the most important thing for me.”