Garden reopens, Knicks return Friday against Wizards

GREENBURGH, N.Y. - With its asbestos scare having already been deemed a "false alarm" by New York City's Department of Environmental Protection, Madison Square Garden announced Wednesday evening it will reopen its doors for the Knicks' next scheduled home game Friday night against the Wizards.

The Knicks were forced to postpone their game against the Orlando Magic on Tuesday night - their first postponement since 1996 - when elevated fiber levels registered in the air after debris fell in the attic, setting off concerns that asbestos had been released.

But a DEP spokesman said later Tuesday evening that further testing showed there was no health risk inside the arena, and the Garden followed suit late Wednesday by announcing that they have received "assurance from the city and environmental experts regarding the safety of the arena."

A makeup date for the Magic game will be announced "in the near future," the statement read.

Earlier in the day the Knicks returned to the basketball court, albeit one that's housed inside their spacious practice facility 30 miles north of midtown. Players and coaches seemed far more amused than concerned about the state of their home court in the wake of Tuesday night's surprising postponement.

"That was one of my better coaching performances," coach Mike D'Antoni said, referring to Magic center Dwight Howard having returned to Orlando Tuesday night without any points or rebounds.

D'Antoni said he received word that Tuesday night's game against the Magic was postponed just as he was about to enter the Garden for a 3 p.m. coaches meeting. Instead he said he immediately turned around and returned home to watch tape of the Bulls, whom the Knicks play Thursday night in Chicago.

"The only thing we can do is take it in the positive way, because when we do play them we'll be a better team because we're young," D'Antoni said. "That's the only way to look at it. And get ready for Chicago. Put it out of your mind and go ahead. It doesn't really disrupt anything."

D'Antoni said many players already had spent some time at the team's training facility for their individual morning-of-game routines. After the players heard of the postponement in the middle of the afternoon, another "five or six" players showed up here to get work in, D'Antoni said.

D'Antoni said he didn't feel a need to call an evening practice because the Knicks have three games in four nights beginning tonight. So the out-of-the-blue postponement Tuesday gave everyone a night off.

"I just sat back and watched TV all day," Amar'e Stoudemire said. "Just took it easy."

Raymond Felton said he was just getting out of the shower at home when he received the 3 p.m. phone call with the news of the postponement. After initially thinking it was a prank call, Felton finally accepted the caller's explanation and said he was disappointed by the development.

"We were ready to play," he said. "I was hyped up."

But Felton promised this incident won't even register as a blip in the back of their minds when they return to their home court.

"If they tell me we're playing, that means they took care of it," he said, "and I'm going to trust that they did it."

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