Just Lin Time: Knicks phenom saving season

David Stern owes Jeremy Lin. Same goes for Mike D’Antoni. The Knicks point guard is saving the NBA Commissioner’s season and his coach’s job.

Lin might be doing it only for the moment, but man, what a moment.

It’s not just that he has led the Knicks to six straight wins, it’s the way he has done it --- the way he did it Tuesday night in Toronto. First, he completed a three-point play with 65 seconds remaining, then he nailed a three-point shot with a half-second left to cap a comeback from 17 points down.

The kid has gone from Harvard to his brother’s couch to the biggest star in a league that manufactures them.

Lin has scored at least 20 points and dished off at least seven assists in all six games of this streak. He’s such supernova that you’d never know the Knicks were still a game under .500 at 14-15.

No matter. He’s saving the Knicks season, probably his coach’s job, and seemingly Stern’s league.

This lockout-corrupted season has been marked by bad play, bad injuries and bad teams. Lots of bad teams, and the Knicks were one of them.

D’Antoni’s future looked bad, and the Stern’s NBA looked worse.

And then came this unknown, undrafted, unheralded kid.

The little miracle-maker is deodorizing a lot of problems. He’s providing a feel-good story for a league that needed it with the likes of Derrick Rose, Dwyane Wade and Carmelo Anthony not playing while the Hornets and Bobcats still were.

How long this lasts, who knows? How wrong the scouts were, who knows?

It might be just a memory when the Knicks face the Bulls on March 12.

Or it might be something not even Tom Thibodeau can defense.

For now though, it's a good story, and that's good enough.