Jim Calhoun was on the phone Thursday afternoon, and in that familiar Boston accent he was talking faster than his Connecticut Huskies used to play. At 79, the Hall of Famer still watches a ton of basketball, college and pro, and he admitted the Knicks confused him last month when they banished his former star for, among other things, a lack of size. 

“When they signed Kemba Walker,” Calhoun said, “he wasn’t 6-5. He was 5-11 before and after they signed the contract and it dried. That didn’t change.” 

Neither did Walker’s game, Calhoun insisted, a decade after the point guard led the Huskies on a surreal run through the Big East Tournament all the way to a national title. 

“I can see it with my own eyes,” said the former UConn coach. “I don’t know if Kemba is quite as good as he once was, but he’s still pretty damn good.” 

Good enough, it turned out, to put on an incredible show Thursday night at Madison Square Garden, where he had produced memorable moments in college and high school. Walker blitzed Washington with 44 points, nine rebounds, eight assists and seven 3-pointers without committing a single turnover in 43 minutes. In fact, the Garden performance was worthy of those delivered by the man who drafted Walker in Charlotte, Michael Jordan, with one exception: 

Jordan would have walked off the floor with a victory. Walker? He left the court with a gutting 124-117 defeat, and with the knowledge the Knicks will wake up Christmas morning not having won two straight games since Halloween. 

“He played a monster game, but we came out with a loss,” Tom Thibodeau said. “So it’s a shame to waste that type of effort with a game like that.” 

It sure is, especially when the Wizards’ best player, Bradley Beal, wasn’t available to play. And especially, in the bigger picture, when New York sports fans beaten down by the Giants and Jets and let down by this Knicks team sure could use a feel-good development to embrace. With Derrick Rose out eight weeks after ankle surgery, the wildly improbable resurgence of Walker as a star would be a hell of a place to start. 

“It felt great,” said the four-time All-Star of his titanic night. “It was a good time. I really wish we could’ve won, to be honest. It’s always tough when you play really well like that and don’t come out on top. It was definitely a very special night.” 

Every member of the New York basketball community who ran into Walker adored him when he was suiting up for the Gauchos in The Bronx and for Rice High in Harlem. On every level he’s played, Walker has led the league in generosity of spirit. His homecoming, at age 31, was a great story, and maybe it didn’t have to die such a grisly premature death after all. 

Walker had 28 points at the half against the Wizards, 23 in the second quarter alone, and 41 after three quarters. He made fadeaway and fall-down 3-pointers, finished off a crazy four-point play, broke some ankles on crossovers, sank all nine of his foul shots, and inspired the crowd to chant his name. 

“I’m watching it with my family and with great joy,” Calhoun texted in the middle of the lovefest. And yet the Knicks played lousy defense all night, Walker didn’t get a call he deserved on a drive with 20 seconds left, and that was that. The Knicks are now 6-11 at home, 14-18 overall and desperate to get some rotation bodies back on the floor. 

But Walker won’t be going back to the bench. He can’t be going back to the bench. It took a half dozen COVID positives and Rose’s injury to return him to the court for the first time since Thibodeau told him he was benched on Nov. 29, and who cares now? For three straight games Walker has looked far more like the player who had averaged more than 20 points per game in five straight seasons (four in Charlotte) than he did the Knick who had a plus/minus of -122 in 444 minutes when Thibs pulled the plug. 

Walker has now given the Knicks 94 points, 23 rebounds, 15 3-pointers and 16 assists in three games. He is clearly playing angry. He is clearly playing in defiance of his coach. “I’m biased,” Calhoun said Thursday afternoon, “but I wouldn’t tell you that a guy can do something if he can’t. And I know Kemba can still score and still help a team win.” 

Man, was he ever right? But in the end, the Knicks didn’t win the game. “We’ll change it,” Walker pledged. “We’ll get there.” 

Let’s hope so, for the sake of a so many beleaguered New York fans who need victories to go along with Kemba Walker’s stunning hometown comeback.