The New York Knicks are fun to watch this season. Win or lose, fans get their money’s worth. Madison Square Garden has energy. And on the road, the Knicks are enjoyable. It’s thanks to Mike D’Antoni’s high-paced offense. In my ideal basketball world, every team in the league would play this way.
Entertainment value aside, the Knicks still lose a lot. They’re better than they were last year, but with 13 wins and 20 losses they sit last in the Atlantic Divison, and if the season ended today would be just 12th in the East.
The season is still young, so NY is just 2 games behind the Milwaukee Bucks for the 8th playoff spot.
Yesterday, coach D’Antoni spoke about the team. The New York Post (Marc Berman) reports:
“There really is something to be said about people playing in a losing situation for a while and get in bad habits,” D’Antoni said. “Bad habits you have to break and it takes time.” The Knicks’ offense, once leading the league, has fallen to fourth at 103.9 points per game, with D’Antoni pointing out his “Seven Seconds or Less” attack has noticeably been creaking. He blamed it partly on Nate Robinson and Al Harrington playing too selfishly. The Knicks had just 13 assists Tuesday. “We’re going to get back to running more, that’s on me,” D’Antoni said. “We got too much 1-on-1 playing. . . . We’re just jacking shots up sometimes.”
The Knicks are in Dallas tonight to face the Mavericks.
