Years later, Patrick Ewing would sit next to a long oak table in the corner of the Georgetown basketball office. He spoke with great enthusiasm for his present passion, training his alma mater. He talked about the difficulty of folding in the trunk of the storage of all the memories he saved as a player.

“My life is a coach now,” he said, laughing. “Nobody wants to hear me tell old war stories. These people [he pointed toward the Hoyas’ practice gym] just want to fool me about how short my shorts are when I play here. “

There is testimony to support Ewing’s words; Georgetown is a Nike school, and that means there is an Air Jordan logo on his shirt, and his sweatpants, and the jacket he wears to the office, there is a large silhouette of Michael Jordan as the flight is dominating one wall.

“I can’t avoid it,” he said, laughing. “But business is business.”

Even so, Ewing admitted only one regret that occasionally slipped from the locked memory boxes, which were still eating it.

“I wish I knew I was playing my last game as Knick when I played it,” he said. “I want to take some mental pictures about it.”

The smile grew melancholy.

“What I know is that the season ends with losses,” he said. “Again.”

He was injured again in the spring of 2000, because that was Ewing’s image as a Trinkets in the end: limping, limping, squinting, wrapped in ice, vulnerable on the trainer’s desk, tending to emerge from the Garden tunnel in a high place. – End the business suit like when warming up.

In 1998, he broke his right wrist, spending most of the year. In ’99, an Achilles bum robbed him from the last four Eastern Conference finals with Indiana, and all the Finals against San Antonio.

This time, it was tendinitis in his right leg. It flared up during the Knicks’ opening round of the Raptors, limiting their effectiveness during their seven annual war games with the Heat (although he got 20 points and 10 rebounds during a win, 7, game, win, dirty, 83-82 Game 7 win. In Miami ).

But against Pacers in the Eastern finals he injured himself early in Game 2, skipped Game 3 and 4 (both narrowly won the Knicks) and returned to help risk the Knicks to lead 18 points at Conseco Fieldhouse in Game 5 before the Pacers stormed back to win and crawl in the game of snatching Final.

On the morning of June 2, 2000, Post readers were greeted with an annual ritual this spring on page 1:

WE WILL WIN

Ewing guaranteed the Knicks victory tonight

Sometimes it’s hard to remember how the Knicks were used to refresh the city. They haven’t won the title as a group, but they are the hardest in sports; Pacers learned that the hard way the previous year. There was little doubt that they would take care of business that night, then engage in some kind of epic passionate game two days later back at Indy.

“I think it will only be one of those series for us,” Ewing said at the time. “This team is developing into difficulties. We will win. “

They did not win. They came out inspired for a quarter, allowing 19,763 in attendance to believe, but then the Pacers drove them out of court. Reggie Miller scored 34, a 5-for-7 shot out of 3. Dale Davis scored 16 rebounds. Final 93-80 but feels far, far worse. Indiana, Mark Jackson kisses Park floor in the last bell.

Ewing played 37 minutes in misery, scoring 18 points, winning 12 rebounds. When he was pulled at the end of the match, there was a bit of a commotion from the remnants of the crowd. As he walked towards the tunnel, he saw a familiar face working for the team for each of 1,174 matches he played as Knick.

“You are still that man,” he said to Ewing.

“No,” Ewing said, smiling, “no more.”

“You will still get your ring,” he said.

“I hope so,” he said, disappearing into the darkness, into the dressing room, where he would soon greet reporters in a familiar blue terrycloth robe, his feet buried in a dueling ice bucket, where he was immediately asked if he would become like that . back for the last year of his $ 16 million contract.

“I will,” he said.

She does not. That will take 110 days, but on September 20, the Knicks sent Ewing to Seattle on a four-team agreement which, in the near future, produced Glen Rice, Luc Longley and Travis Knight – and in the long run locked them in salary. close the jail where they languished for almost a decade. Ewing survived another two years, never looking right in the tacky colors of Sonics or Orlando Magic.

Never got the ring. Or the last chapter he really wants.

In his office in Georgetown that Friday in October 2018 Patrick Ewing – who recently revealed that he had been treated for COVID-19 – reaffirmed what he said on the night of February 28, 2003, at Madison Square Garden, when his number, 33, was officially appointed to the rafters of Garden, taking the right place among the franchise giants.

“I’m a Knick,” he said. “I will always be a Knick.”

Twenty years ago Tuesday, without realizing it, he said goodbye to the chapter of his life. He hoped it could be different. He is not alone.