The Portland Trailblazers rolled into Madison Square Garden last night sporting the 5th best record in the NBA but had lost 5 of their previous 8 games. The Knicks were once again without Kenyon Martin who is still nursing his injured ankle and is expected to miss at least another week.
The two teams played an exciting opening quarter that saw Wesley Matthews score 9 points but he would be outdone by Carmelo Anthony who earlier was selected as the Eastern Conference’s player of the month for the month of January. Melo scored 14 points including a personal 5-0 mini run capped off with a buzzer beater sending the crowd into a frenzy.
New York’s second unit would provide the team a major boost as it was able to get their points and not allow Portland, the league’s highest scoring team to get their rhythm. JR Smith and Amar’e Stoudemire were particularly on their games working well together with Smith setting up the big man for a thunderous dunk. Even seldom used Jeremy Tyler would put his footprint on the game during his stint on the court during the first half with energy plays including an emphatic rejection of Blazers point guard, Damian Lillard.
The Knicks would close out the half in style with a myriad of crowd pleasing plays most notably a block and subsequent uncontested jam by Anthony followed by an Iman Shumpert steal and highlight reel finish by Tim Hardaway Jr.
New York’s defense however was unable to keep the Blazers in check as Portland would open up a 10 point lead. Even with MVP candidate, LaMarcus Aldridge struggling with his shot throughout the game. As they did in their previous game against the Bucks, New York would scratch and claw their way back but had trouble getting over the hump. With the game winding down and New York down by 8, Smith & Hardaway Jr would connect on back to back 3 pointers sandwiched by a Pablo Prigioni steal to narrow the gap with less than a minute to go.
The game would come down to one defensive possession for the Knicks. Portland went right into their big man, Aldridge who has been the team’s best player all season long. LaMarcus would calmly drain a medium range turnaround jumper over the outstretched arm of Tyson Chandler and after a missed layup attempt by Anthony on New York’s next possession the Knicks comeback bid would fall just short.
Mike Woodson had to be restrained by assistant coach, Darrell Walker from getting into an altercation with official, Danny Crawford for not calling a foul on Melo’s late attempt. After the game Woodson went on to say, “We put Melo in a great position, down four, with 35 seconds on the clock, and I looked back on the tape and I thought it was clearly a foul.”
Final
Knicks 90 TrailBlazers 94
Notes:
Raymond Felton sat out the entire fourth quarter after another subpar performance.
New York only committed 9 turnovers
Neither team shot better than 40% from the field
Wilson Caicedo: PureSportsNY