New York Knicks Star Offers Tribute to Isaiah Hartenstein

After a week of tongue-in-cheek verbal jousting, Josh Hart was finally willing to show a little love to a former New York Knicks teammate.

One of the primary headlines surrounding the Knicks’ Friday night fracas with the Oklahoma City Thunder (8 p.m. ET, MSG/NBA TV) is the fact that New York will face former center Isaiah Hartenstein for the first time since he inked a three-year, $87 million deal with the artists formerly known as the Seattle SuperSonics.

As the Knicks prepared at Paycom Center, Hart offered tribute to Hartenstein in a way only he could, mixing legitimate respect with humorously biting commentary.

“You don’t really know the true ability or unselfishness of a player until you are teammates,” Hart said, per Stefan Bondy of the New York Post. “In LA with the Clippers, he was solid. But he got to New York and played a style and brand of basketball that [head coach Tom Thibodeau] loves.”

“He was a great locker room guy for us, unselfish, didn’t care for the spotlight, did all the dirty work things and won us a playoff game. I think he had 10 offensive rebounds. And didn’t care about scoring. He was like, ‘I’m going to dominate the glass.’ So when he’s your teammate, you love him. Now that he’s not your teammate, he can go smoke one.”

Hart’s trademark sense of humor has had a little sting to it when addressing Hartenstein’s departure and he remained consistent after the Knicks’ most recent effort: following a 119-103 win over the Utah Jazz at Madison Square Garden,the Knicks’ nineth in a row, Hart jokingly hoped that Hartenstein’s new payday would slow him down.

Hartenstein was an NBA journeyman for four seasons, playing for four different teams before getting a getting a two-year, $16 million deal from the Knicks. Last year served as his breakout campaign, as he took over the Knicks’ starting center spot when Mitchell Robinson went down.

In 49 appearances in the starting lineup, Hartenstein averaged 9.4 rebounds and 8.7 points and led all playoff participants in offensive rebounds until Dallas’ Dereck Lively replaced him during the latter stages of the NBA Finals. As Hart alluded to, one of his finest showings was a 12-offensive rebound performance during Game 5 of the conference semifinals against the Indiana Pacers, tying a Knicks single-game playoff record set by Charles Oakley during the 1994 run to the Finals.

Hartenstein played that into a bit deal from the Thunder and has justified that payday to the tune of 12.6 points and 12.2 rebounds a game, both which stand as career-highs. All that comes after Hartenstein missed the first half of this season after enduring a hand injury during the exhibition slate.

Though the Knicks’ interior situation has been well-maintained by Karl-Anthony Towns, there’s no denying a certain brand of paint power was lost upon Hartenstein’s departure — and he’ll have a prime opportunity to prove it tonight.

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