A System With Teeth

Charlotte trailed by six with two minutes left. Dawson called a set that used Marcus as a decoy and Luka as the trigger. The Knicks switched it. Luka backed out, pointed Tyrese to the corner, and waited. Daniel watched from the second row behind the bench, heart punching his ribs. The shot clock hit six. Marcus sprinted from the weakside as if coming for a handoff. Instead he planted, reversed, and cut backdoor. Luka bounced the pass through a window the size of a wallet. Layup. Four-point game. Next possession, Tyrese ripped the ball from an All-Star wing, dove, and called timeout before sliding out of bounds. The bench mobbed him like he had scored fifty. Charlotte won in overtime.