Obviously the bulls win was good to stop the bleeding, but we played bad and beat a bad team. I was happy we won, but unimpressed. This game we played well against a really good team, and did enough right for me to feel good about it going forward.

The Good:
Good scoring
First off, we won primarily by putting a ton of points up. Thats the identity of this team, so that is how we should be winning. We are not a slow it down, grind it out team, we are a high octane offensive team, we just haven't been playing like it.

Good Guard play.
When the game started I was impressed with Steph, not the scoring, but the passing. He was finding guys in good spots, and that was refreshing to see, because we haven't seen that from him or anybody else on our squad in ages. He also was focussed on attacking when he found an opening, and was deadly from the arc. This is exactly how he played under Lenny and Herb, except now he Ds up. We'll see how long it lasts. Jamal woke up in the 2n half and added to our offensive attack as well, in spite of a couple of really bad forced shots.

Good defense in spots
We got stops, turnovers, and fast breaks and had stretches where we could build a lead off our defensive work. That has been a big problem for us, we can build leads, but its usually a result of the other team missing, not because of our activity on D. That was great to see. The fact that we were able to turn the 'D' switch on at all was a big plus for us tonight. Even EC with the blocks, with a critical one in the late 4th that included a scowl. You gotta love that.

Low Turnovers
We had (14) which is what the top 3rd of teams avg. per game or better.
Thank EC and Zach for that, they combined for 10 TOs last game, with only 4 this game (thats below their average). I think its also a result of not going to Curry so much because Steph was running the offense through him and Zach mostly.

Good bench play
The usual Lee and Balk did well, but so did Nate, which is a key for us, because our guard play has not been a strength.



The Bad:
Rebounds
we got mauled on the boards and Utah got a ton of 2nd and 3rd chances to score after missing. That has to stop!! In general, we wont play well enough to get beaten this badly on the boards and win. Zach did his thing with 14 but Curry and Q had 5 and 1 respectively. Thats unacceptable.

Defense
We played good defense in spots. That is, in the spots between the stretches where Deron or Boozer weren't waltzing in the lane for lay ups and dunks. There was intensity throughout, but we gave up way too many easy buckets, and again, we aren't good enough to do that and win many games. We did play tough on the guards (Deron earned most of his with good play) but in the paint, I was feeling like we were watching the Shandon EisleySpoon days. Millsap had a stretch in the 3rd where he was looking like Olajuwon. I mean this is a guy who's first name I can't even remember. That worries me. In the end, we clamped down enough in the crunch to pull it out, but the game shouldn't have been that close to begin with.

How many times do I have to watch a guy wide open right under the basket, and Zach, Curry, or Lee have their backs to him and dont even see him until he has the ball about to dunk it? Its just happening too much. And the pick and roll is like kryptonite for us. I swear, its like these guys have never seen the play before. Its gotta stop.

TOs
We made several unforced turnovers in the crunch. Steph and Zach both did it. As it turns out, they both played well enough to redeem themselves later, but the basketball gods will not always be so kind. I think we had 4 big TOs in the 2nd half of the 4th. If we weren't playing so well on Offense, that would have killed us.

Bottom line:
We need Starbury for us to win. Not the neutered LB Steph, not the Diva/Crazy Steph, but the Starbury who said he was the best 4 years ago. When he played like that then, the team wasn't big enough or balanced enough for us to win. But with this squad, we can win like that, we ought to win like that, its how the team is built. When he plays well he makes others better, and thats more true for him than for any other player on our team. Zach has proven his worth on the boards alone, and continues to make big plays in the crunch, particularly on the boards. We never had that before. Craw needs to give us about 17 every single night.

We won against this team with a crappier squad last year at the Garden in more exciting fashion and we went nowhere.

This was the game when we get all stars lined up for us.
Everybody hit shots, opponent turn it over in a clutch, and all bounces went our way.
But we played good enough to take these opportunities.
So this is good win. We’ll see if this can happened more often.

Posted by arkrud:

This was the game when we get all stars lined up for us.
Everybody hit shots, opponent turn it over in a clutch, and all bounces went our way.
But we played good enough to take these opportunities.
So this is good win. We’ll see if this can happened more often.

akrud, 3 of our 4 wins, one close loss (Cleveland) and arguably parts of the Orlando game were played similarly by the Knicks. I am not sure if this is an aberration or if the disastrous stretch was one, or we are just going to be inconsistent. To go out of the way to diminish the strong play is not terribly fair, but my feeling is that this will be an inconsistent team.

btw, we turned the ball over in the clutch too tonight, but we made good plays as well.

"There were a lot of loose balls down there…almost a rugby scrum at the rim a few times…we were able to cause them to miss a few layups and, of course, we had the 6 blocks," Lee said.

Lee is proud of the blocks lol

"They looked great tonight. They were talking, they were communicating. Honestly, I was impressed. They have a really talented team. We found out about it, and so did the Chicago Bulls," said Boozer.

I have said and continue to say that we need to allow this team to play out this season and become what they are, not assign them an identity based on the past. After 11 games people want to lock the team into what they had shown up to that point and all some of us are saying is to see what this team can do when it get's settled.

Sometimes teams just get off track and i'm tired of guys saying "what track". You can see that this team started off with the wrong mentality and after being embarrased it seems that they are beginning to understand what they have to do to win. We've seen the team start to improve defensively little by little and now the offense came with the D and all we're looking for is for the team to just continue to progress along these lines.

Last year the team started of slow and then got into a progressive pattern of improvement. Many don't want to acknowledge it cuz we ended so poorly, but they all know that before the injuries this team actually improved each month. Now if we can get this team to do that with what many feel is a better squad, then we should be in good shape. No one is saying it's a lock to happen, but, this is the kind of thing a team can build on and that's a good thing.

You have to be honest in looking at the losing streak. It wasn't all blowouts, only a couple of bad games and some close losses. That's what happens when you're not playing right. These wins were earned because the team gave the right effort and is starting to play the right way. Let's see if we can continue this the rest of the way.

How come we didn't build on the Denver home win? At the end of the month no matter how you slice it the best we can do is finish 6-9 which is terrible. Looks like we're going to finish possibly 5-10 which that's what I said they would do. This team looks the exact same as last yr possibly worse.

Does the term "middle ground" mean anything to you?

How did the Jazz play considerably worse? They fought back into the game and had strong performances from their two stars. The main thing they did worse than usual was give up points, but that's because the Knicks were doing a good job on offense, which the team has also shown the ability to. Even so, defensively there was visibly more effort in contesting shots.

Of course, the team has not done it consistently, and played as bad as any Knick team in memory, but the few games we've won or played well in cannot be dismissed as irrelevant either.

I think you are underestimating the offensive ability of the team. Problem is that the guards are not/have not been consistent. However, the evidence is beginning to accumulate that when the Knicks get strong play from their guards (more often dependent on Crawford, because usually Curry scores more and Marbury less) they can win games, even against good competition.

I suggested the other day that this may have a residual effect on their defensive play because by being involved on offense they may have more desire to play D.

Have the Knicks not shown the ABILITY to hustle and play well enough to beat good teams?

Did you watch the first 3 games of the season?

[Edited by - PresIke on 11-27-2007 01:12 AM]

PresIke, no matter how logical your argument, there are those who will refuse to acknowledge your points. It's funny how easy it is to forget that during the streak there were a lot of circumstances that came together at the same time to contribute to the streak. Injury, Death, Westcoast and turmoil.

The team lost it's way and almost imploded, but it didn't and they've fought thru that and somehow pulled things back together. All we wanted was for the guards to play like they played in the 1st 3 games and for the team as a whole to improve defensively. Isiah and the players all made mistakes, but that's not what is most important. What is most important is how you recover from those mistakes. Some of us have been saying that this team could play far better than the way it looked during the streak and it seems at least for now that they've gotten back to what they did early on, but with the addition of more cohesive D. Isn't that really all we wanted?

IF you're a fan of this team you have to be pulling for this team to get it together and play more consistently like they did tonight. They may not always have such a good shooting night, but the effort on D should be there and then they'll give themselves a chance to win games. We needed a win like this cuz there are some tough games ahead and the team needs the confidence to go into those games knowing what they can do. Let's hope they can get some things done.

Posted by nixluva:

PresIke, no matter how logical your argument, there are those who will refuse to acknowledge your points. It's funny how easy it is to forget that during the streak there were a lot of circumstances that came together at the same time to contribute to the streak. Injury, Death, Westcoast and turmoil.

And what was the biggest factor? I'd say Marbury. Is it likely to recur in some fashion? Yes. But who am I to rain on the ongoing parade in your mind.