John Ri Manhattan College, a modestly-sized third level institution in the Bronx with a modestly-ranked athletics department, resonates quite deeply with the GAA in New York.

Most basketball fans with even the slightest bit of self-respect become worn out pretty quickly by whatever the New York Knicks are selling.

At first the words seemed to trip nonchalantly from the mouth of Walter ‘Clyde’ Frazier, a basketball analyst for whom loquaciousness is a job description.

Gail Goodrich knew Miami would beat Boston the other night.

Back when I met Dave Hopla last March, he told a story which gives an insight into Kobe Bryant.

THE CREAM OF THE CROP

The most high profile rebranding of a US sports team of the past decade needs all the help it can get and the Brooklyn Nets ticked two important boxes this week: they beat the New York Knicks on Monday night and got into a fight in Boston on Wednesday.

All in all, it hasn’t been a bad weekend for boxing Stateside.

A good friend lives on Dean Street and has watched with dread as this stadium has gradually risen almost literally on her doorstep.

Sometime, somehow, sports professionals ceased to be real people.

Sprung from the bench, he destroyed the New Jersey Nets with 25 points and seven assists.

CHRISTMAS DAY is the jewel in the crown of the NBA season but this year it will bring with it a bigger gift than ever: basketball’s return from the brink.

I SAW Joe Frazier at Madison Square Garden but not, alas, in the Fight of the Century. It was just last January and Joe was courtside for Knicks-Spurs in the NBA.

IN the year I saw my first live NBA game, it was worth a sleepless night to catch the season’s last.

NEW YORKERS take sportvery seriously and have some ofthe best known teams in the world operating out of legendary venues.

High among the rafters at Madison Square Garden, tens of thousands of balloons, red, white and blue, strain against nets waiting to drop on to a cheering crowd below.