MIAMI — Immanuel Quickley wore a walking boot as he limped toward the Knicks’ locker room early Monday evening, and his status for Game 4 unsurprisingly was made official a few minutes later.
In the latest ankle injury to affect the second-round series between the Knicks and the Heat, Quickley was ruled out with a sprained left ankle.
The Sixth Man of the Year finalist had appeared in 81 of 82 regular-season games and the first eight games of the postseason.
Quickley suffered the injury when he got tangled up with Heat center Bam Adebayo while both were going for a loose ball during the fourth quarter of Game 3 on Saturday afternoon.
Quickley remained down on the court for several minutes before hobbling to the locker room.
He said after the game that the injury “hurt a lot.”
The 23-year-old Quickley has struggled to match his regular-season impact during the playoffs, averaging 9.0 points per game and shooting just 24.3 percent (9-for-37) in eight games off the bench against the Cavaliers and the Heat.
Second-year guard Miles McBride was likely to assume some of Quickley’s rotation minutes in Game 4.
He had played 13 minutes over four prior playoff appearances this spring.
The other options would have been little-used veterans Evan Fournier and Derrick Rose.
Fournier has not appeared in any game of this year’s postseason entering Monday’s contest, while Rose played three minutes at the end of Game 3 in the first round against the Cavaliers.
Before that brief stint, the former league MVP had played only two minutes since Dec. 31.
Backup center Isaiah Hartenstein didn’t expect any carryover from the Game 3 dustup involving Heat big man Cody Zeller, who was shoved by Hartenstein following a takedown of Knicks teammate Julius Randle.
“You just start over,” said Hartenstein, who was pushed by Heat forward Caleb Martin following his shove of Zeller in the minor fracas. “I think every game is a new game. It’s the playoffs, it’s gonna be physical, so I think we’re going into it regardless, no matter what happened before.
“We lost, so we’re just going into it with more physicality and with a chip on our shoulder. I think that’s, like I said, every playoff game will get more and more physical. So we’re just going into it like that.”