By MARC BERMAN

The NBA has suspended Kobe Bryant for tonight’s game

against the Knicks because of an accidental hit on Manu Ginobili Sunday. Maybe the league can also accidently give back some refunds to the Garden customers paying an arm and a leg to watch Kobe’s lone Garden appearance.

Bryant and the Lakers plays the Garden just once a year. The Garden is sold-out tonight for one reason – to see Kobe. Fans probably bought a mini-season-ticket plan with the Lakers’ game in it just to assure them good seats for this game. And now they don’t get him because of a San Antonio incident that seemed less-than-worthy of a suspension. The Lakers writers never mentioned in their stories the chance of Bryant getting hit by a suspension. It stunned everyone.

Bryant was outraged at the decision at the morning shootaround at the Garden this morning, as our Brian Costello was on the scene. Phil Jackson feels the league is still picking on Bryant.

Common sense should have prevailed. Why the league would not want Bryant to perform on basketball’s biggest stage tonight is baffling. The NBA is dying and commissioner David Stern is killing it.

All Stern cares about is expanding awareness in Europe while the game dies here. If this game was in Spain, bet Stern would not have allowed Bryant to be suspended.

Meanwhile, the Knicks will be without Quentin Richardson, who is out with a bad elbow. Jared Jeffries will get the start most likely but will not have to worry about getting embarrassed by Kobe. No Quentin, no Kobe. The Knicks win in that exchange just a little.