NEW YORK — What De’Aaron Fox thought versus what De’Aaron Fox did were two very different things. And the disastrous disconnect between them, make no mistake, might have cost the San Antonio Spurs a title.In his mind, as the veteran Spurs guard explained after the worst collapse in NBA Finals history against the New York Knicks, a 107-106 loss in Wednesday’s Game 4, he would turn on the afterburners for which he has long been known and leave the Knicks’ OG Anunoby in his wake. The Spurs guard’s nickname is “Swipa,” after all, a hat-tip to the elite speed that has always been his greatest superpower.Surely, then, he could chase down the ball that he’d tipped to himself and finish the break as if he were in the pregame layup line while putting the Spurs up three with 11 seconds to go. Even with the ailments that slowed him last month, including a high ankle sprain that he reinjured in the Western Conference finals against the Oklahoma City Thunder, Fox was sure that his wheels would still work.“I just thought I’d be able to outrun him,” he said. “That’s it.”He thought wrong.The remarkable part, given the plot twist at the end of the game’s second-biggest play, is that Anunoby was running the wrong way when it began. The 6-foot-7, 240-pound wing was chasing the long rebound off a Jalen Brunson missed 3, only to see Fox poke the ball right past him and head the other way. That he found a way to catch up, after getting caught flat-footed and facing the wrong direction, shocked everyone in the building. No one more so than Fox himself.Fox, who lost some speed at the start of his sprint when Anunoby bumped him as he ran by, clearly saw Anunoby by the time they reached the paint, and still decided to go ahead with the plan. It backfired dramatically, with Anunoby swatting the layup and the greater basketball world immediately wondering why Fox instead didn’t dribble the ball out to kill time while waiting for the foul (and subsequent free throws).