Isiah Doubts He’ll Be Fired

What could have been Isiah Thomas’ final day as team president and coach turned into just another bizarre day in Knick-land, with Thomas all but claiming Friday that he will not be fired this season.

Although he figures to be the target of more “Fire Isiah” chants today when his 2-9 Knicks, losers of eight straight games, host the equally pitiful 2-8 Chicago Bulls, Thomas, in effect, said that Garden fans who come to serenade him are wasting their collective breath.

“There’s a lot of time to right the ship and I’ve been in tough situations where I’ve had to roll up my sleeves and get the job done, and this is no exception,” Thomas said.

When asked if he is convinced in his frequent conversations with Garden CEO Jim Dolan that he truly has a lot of time to turn around what has been a disastrous season, on and off the court, Thomas said, “I don’t foresee there being any changes this year.”

Dolan has refused to comment on Thomas’ status throughout the first 11 games, so there is no way of telling if Thomas actually has been given an assurance that he will be on the bench for the entire season. The way the Knicks have quit on Thomas in the past three games would seem to indicate that his days are numbered.

But Dolan, of course, always has shown undying loyalty to Thomas and has often paid no attention to his team’s record or how hard it competes in deciding who should stay and who should go. Dolan is expected to be in his usual baseline seat near the Knicks’ bench today but will probably make himself unavailable for interviews on the most important issue facing his reeling team. The Knicks have lost their last three games by an average of 23 points.

If Dolan, in fact, has decided to keep Thomas for the entire season, it could be because the Anucha Browne Sanders sexual harassment case is on appeal, and Dolan could be waiting for the case to run its course before firing Thomas and starting over. According to legal experts, the appeal probably will not be heard until April, at the earliest, with the Garden given very little chance of having the verdict overturned.

Thomas, 46, did not mention the case, in which he and the Garden were found liable - with Dolan and MSG being on the hook for $11.6 million - when he was asked why he didn’t expect to be pink-slipped. Instead, he cited the NBA calendar.

“I just don’t think that this is the time to panic, after 11games in the season,” said Thomas, who signed a contract extension with the Knicks in March. “This is not the time to just blow everything up and to say that the guys we’ve got here and the changes and the moves we made, after 11games, you judge it. That’s not the way this league goes.