After his news conference in New York Tuesday, new Knicks coach Mike D’Antoni was a guest on ESPN’s “Pardon the Interruption” and made his first public comments on his departure from the Suns to hosts Michael Wilbon and Tony Kornheiser:

 Q: What went wrong?

  D’Antoni: Honestly, before the jump ball with the San Antonio series, I thought that I would finish my career in Phoenix. I was already to start fishing around for an extension. Just things happened during that series that we got on a different page. There was a trust in my mind, and I could be the cause of it, but there was a trust broken. And I didn’t think it was fair to the fans and it wasn’t fair to the players and it definitely wasn’t fair to (managing partner) Robert Sarver, who was paying me a lot of money to come back, to not have the feeling I had before. Once it got to that point emotionally, I just decided, ‘You know what? This is better for everybody if I just go.  I didn’t want to take the money, I didn’t want to make it where they had to fire me. I wanted to find a way that I could coach and exit gracefully, get the money that is due to me, and it worked out. I didn’t want to leave anybody with a bad taste in their mouths. I thought we had four great years, but this is best for me and best for Phoenix that I’m in New York.

 Q: Coaches like to say that they don’t like to look at one event for causing a chain reaction. But is it possible looking back on Game 1 of the San Antonio series (which the Suns lost in double overtime), that series was so epic and left such a disappointment — Steve Nash told us it on this show it was like a kick in the groin to lose Game 1, who knows what happens the rest of this postseason, it is likely you’re still playing?

 D’Antoni: I agree with you 100 percent. That’s probably the crux of it. There’s so much frustration over the previous years. We had the suspensions the year before we thought we were the better team; Joe Johnson having his face broken four years ago, not being able to play against the Spurs. It really got to the point where we had them, we could’ve beat them in Game 1. We blew it. I’ll take responsibility for it. We blew the game, but from there it unraveled, and it unraveled in different ways. Maybe I was paranoid. Maybe people were out to get me. Whoi knows, but I do know there was a trust broken and once it’s gone, it’s like a divorce, it’s hard to go back. I didn’t think it was fair to anybody that I went back there and did a job I didn’t feel I could go back and do my best.

  Q: If you absolve the owner, and you sat it has nothing to do with the owner, it leads to the conclusion that it’s got to be a personality conflict between you and the gneral manager, Steve Kerr. Would that be fair to say?

 D’Antoni: I don’t know if it’s a personality conflict. Maybe it was a difference of opinion on certain things that happened. He even said he made some mistakes he would do over. I made some mistakes I should do over. We just got on different pages. He didn’t hire me, and I didn’t have that comfort level that he hired me. So already, the situation wasn’t the greatest to start with, and it kind of went south and it looked good, and I thought it was fine toward the end of the year, but that Game 1, I think, threw a wrench into the works, and here we are.”

 Q: The player most associated with you success in Phoenix is Steve Nash. How did he take the news of you leaving?

 D’Antoni: We talked, we had a long talk. He thanked me, I thanked him. He was terrific and I thought it was just a great blend of two guys that were on the same page and could get the max out of the team and out of (ourselves) individually. He’s one of the best people I’ve been around and associated with and I can say that about a lot of the Suns players. We had a unique group that I was just privileged to coach. I really want to thank the Colangelos, the Sarvers, all of them. It was a great run.”

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