Sunday, November 24, 2013

Time to Press the Panic Button


It might be time to push the button. After yet another loss in Washington Saturday night, the team is now 3-9 and heading into a tough west coast road trip. On Monday the Knicks go to the Rose Garden to take on a sizzling Blazers team led by Damian Lillard. John Wall destroyed the Knicks with not much of a jump, so you can imagine what last season’s Rookie of the Year will have in store for Beno Udrih and Pablo Prigioni who will be taking the place of an injured Raymond Felton.

After a heart-breaker on Wednesday night when the Knicks were a finger-tip away from beating the best team in the Eastern Conference - the Indiana Pacer -  they followed that with a loss to the Wizards. The Knicks defense in the second half was terrible as Wall, young sniper Bradley Beal and Martell Webster had their way, scoring 31, 18, and 19 points respectively. It was very familiar to Wednesday night’s game when Paul George torched the Knicks in the second half scoring 23 of his game-high 35 points in the fourth quarter and overtime alone.

The team simply has not been on the same page on either offense or defense. The buckets aren’t dropping. The rotations are too late. Coach Woodson has to grab control of this spiraling team before those Calipari whispers become chants. Woodson’s favoring of playing Smith with a big lineup and putting Shumpert on the bench is just not working. Last year’s team was at its best when they had Melo at the four, Shump at the three and Smith at the two. These big lineups are too clunky. For a second straight night Andrea Bargnani did not shoot the basketball well, putting more pressure and double teams on Melo. Smith was especially awful, missing all four of his free throw attempts in the fourth quarter in addition to a couple of mental mistakes that cost the team late. Amar’e Stoudemire had his best game of the year posting 12 points, but only two of those coming in the second half.

This upcoming week the Knicks face two top Western Conference teams in Portland and the Clippers followed with a Melo homecoming at Denver. If Woodson doesn’t make some changes and get everyone on the same page the Knicks might be 3-12 heading into December.


No comments:

Post a Comment