They are basketball brothers, bound by a friendship of three decades, a kinship formed by once sharing a locker room and by a common professional pursuit that often ended in frustration.

Paul Silas and Don Chaney meet again today in Madison Square Garden, this time with conflicting goals, as the Hornets and New York Knicks face off in a 1 p.m. NBA matinee.

Silas and Chaney are each in need of a victory. Silas' Hornets, 18-21 overall, stumbled in three of their past four games. Chaney's Knicks are in even greater need of a turnaround game. They are 14-24, having lost seven in a row and nine of the past 10.

It's a scenario that doesn't play well in New York. Chaney took over Dec. 10 after Jeff Van Gundy resigned. The Knicks, 11-9 when Van Gundy departed, are 3-15 under Chaney. He could be dismissed at any time, one New York newspaper reported last week.

Silas also knows how difficult this could be. He was an assistant in Charlotte four seasons ago when Dave Cowens abruptly resigned. After taking the reins on an interim basis, he had to push to earn the job full-time.

"Don wasn't looking for this when it happened, and I wasn't looking for mine when it came through," Silas said.

The former Boston Celtics teammates had been looking, however. Each had been a head coach before, Silas with the San Diego (now Los Angeles) Clippers, Chaney with the Clippers, Houston Rockets and Detroit Pistons. But in the seasons that followed each settled into long-term roles as an assistant. They have never coached on the same staff.

They wanted to get back into the hot seat.

"I first met Don when I joined the Celtics in '72," Silas said. "He's a great person, just one of the best I've ever met. And as a player he was one of the best one-on-one defenders.

"After we finished playing we both went into coaching. We became really close as we both pursued our coaching careers. We talked, even though we were in different places, about how we would both like to have another shot.

"But we knew. It is just very difficult. Chances were flying by. You just get kind of labeled as a lifetime assistant. College coaches became hot for a while (as NBA coaching candidates). Now it's former players.

"I was hoping when Don got this job that he could do well enough to keep it. And it's not over yet, but it's so tough. ... I guess the biggest thing is the respect -- you've got to get the players to respect you, and it's tough when you've been one way (in dealing with them) as an assistant and have to be another way as the head coach."

Silas doesn't want to add to Chaney's problems. But neither, today, does he want to leave behind a victory for his friend.