Knicks president Phil Jackson stayed away from the shores of Lake Erie on a historic Thursday night in Cleveland. It was LeBron James’ Homecoming Part 2, but it also turned into the night Derek Fisher became his own man and own coach — never again to be classified as Jackson’s puppet.

From an evening dedicated to King James emerged “The Fisher King’’ and his first victory as an NBA head coach. There was so much to like about Fisher’s unconventional approach to facing the Cavaliers, using 11 different players in the first 13 minutes. Fisher loudly proclaimed through actions his rotation has no boundaries, and he made hard decisions with established players on minutes.

We all know about the flowery rhetoric that flutters from Fisher’s lips, as a player, union president and since accepting Jackson’s offer in June. The athletic director at Arkansas-Little Rock thought Fisher, as a student, would wind up as governor of Arkansas or a state senator.

Well, this budding state senator who lists Bill Clinton as one of his compadres can coach, too.

“I thought about how fortunate I am to be in this situation in life where you go to work and this many people are excited about what’s going to happen on the court,’’ Fisher said when asked about the electric night’s festivities. “It was a fun night, and obviously we feel better about getting the win, but we’ll enjoy it for a few hours and by the time we get back into the city, we’ll get ready for Charlotte.”

Fisher made all the right moves in deploying nearly his whole roster. Third-string center Cole Aldrich, who showed ruggedness in fourth-quarter garbage time in the season-opening horror against Chicago, got rotation time; undrafted free agent Travis Wear, a long shot to make the roster, was asked to defend James in the early going; Fisher rolled with Quincy Acy as starting power forward just as he rolled with him in preseason, sticking with his convictions and moving Amar’e Stoudemire back to a reserve role.

Fisher kept Anthony, who had four fouls, out for the first six minutes of the fourth quarter — a delicious move that had him springy down the stretch.

Fisher benched starting center Samuel Dalembert for the final three quarters after playing just 5:34, figuring he couldn’t affect the game with a sore left calf. He held down former rookie sensation Tim Hardaway Jr.’s minutes to 4:45 in a bold maneuver that bears watching. Hardaway was awful on both ends in the season-opening blowout loss to Chicago.

What made Fisher’s night even more special was how he started his postgame press conference. The first question: “What stood out about tonight?’’

There were dozens of different ways Fisher could have responded after the Knicks spoiled the Homecoming King’s night and quieted The Q. Fisher got contributions from all over the place.

Instead, this is how Fisher answered: “Tim Hardaway Jr. He played four minutes, and the level of support and commitment to his teammates and how involved he was in the game, although he wasn’t in, says a lot about him and who we are trying to become. It was a great team win tonight.’’

Some mocked Fisher afterward for the silliness of citing Hardaway’s cheerleading role after this stunning win. Mark it down as Fisher’s first move in attempting to massage the big egos found on every NBA roster, no matter how strange that sound bite seemed. No mention or barb at Hardaway’s recent poor play. Yes, Fisher is no Jackson, who recently published a pointed scouting report on each player, citing Hardaway doesn’t finish well with his left hand.

The triangle offense was pilloried from every angle after the season-opening 104-80 bust against Chicago. But Fisher still had his team believing the following night. J.R. Smith said when the team watched film in the Cleveland hotel, there was a lot of chatter, a lot of players voicing opinions about the viewing.

“We showed a high level of trust and confidence in each other,’’ Fisher said. “If they just execute the basic things we’ve been teaching them and working on, things will work out. We showed a lot of patience and composure and those are the things that we need as we move through this season. We won’t always play perfect and win games going away, so to be able to win a close game on the road this early in the season is a good way for us to get back to work and start looking ahead to Charlotte.’’

Fisher probably started Stoudemire on opening night for political reasons, knowing the six-time All-Star was confused by his preseason bench role. It was a mistake. Fisher grew as a coach in Cleveland. He played Wear in the first quarter to defend James in a game on national TV. That’s guts. That’s also sending out the stern message nobody’s job or role is safe.

Fisher is already an orator. Thursday in LeBron’s house, The Fisher King became a coach.