Blazers Ugly At End; Knicks Even Uglier

The Trail Blazers played like they wanted to give this game away. The Knicks reacted like unwilling recipients.

Arvydas Sabonis and Brian Grant scored 21 points each and Portland, despite making several late mistakes and generating almost no offense in the final 4 minutes, defeated New York 82-77 in Madison Square Garden Thursday night.

Portland did not score from the field in the final 4:16, missed a pair of free throws, committed stupid fouls and repeatedly turned the ball over. But no mistake was bigger than the one the Knicks made with 7.4 seconds left - a 5-second violation on Charles Oakley.

New York, which trailed throughout the fourth quarter, was behind 80-77 and had no timeouts remaining when Oakley was unable to inbound the ball from under Portland’s basket.

After the violation was called, Rick Brunson sank the deciding two free throws with 3.7 seconds left.

Sonics re-sign Zidek

The Seattle SuperSonics signed 7-foot center George Zidek to a second 10-day contract.

Since being signed by the Sonics on March 9, the former UCLA star and No. 1 draft choice of Charlotte in 1995 has shot 1 for 5, including his first career 3-point basket.

Spurs to retire ‘00’

Johnny Moore, the career assists leader for the University of Texas and the San Antonio Spurs will have his 00 jersey retired during halftime of their game Friday against Charlotte.

Moore, a point guard, passed for 3,865 assists, an average of 7.4 a game, during his nine seasons in the NBA that began in 1980-81. He averaged 8.6 assists before contracting a form of meningitis commonly called “Desert Fever,” in 1985. He also had 1,017 steals.

On the courts

Steve Smith sank a go-ahead bank shot and Eldridge Recasner hit a pair of free throws with 4.3 seconds left as the Atlanta Hawks rallied in the final minute to defeat the Milwaukee Bucks 84-81 in Atlanta.

In East Rutherford, N.J., Kendall Gill hit a go-ahead jumper with 1:54 left and the New Jersey Nets went on to defeat the Orlando Magic 93-87.

Reggie Miller scored 20 points as the Indiana Pacers survived a fourth-quarter rally to defeat the Wizards 95-91 in Washington.

In Boston, Hakeem Olajuwon scored 15 of his season-high 33 points in the fourth quarter as the Houston Rockets finally beat back the pressing Celtics for their fifth consecutive victory, 105-96.