Coach Mike D’Antoni said he’s “antsy” to fix the struggling Knicks, and understands why the fans are frustrated with the team’s poor play.
“Understandably,” D’Antoni said. “Hey, I’m panicking. But not in that sense. We’ll get this done.”
There’s plenty of pessimism surrounding the slumping 35-35 Knicks, losers of six of seven. The optimist would say the team requires time to gel because of the recent Carmelo Anthony trade, and that consistent winning isn’t going to happen overnight. But right now, the Knicks are a mess, and they carry a three-game losing streak into tonight’s game with the 45-26 Magic at the Garden.
“We’ve just got to keep our focus on getting to the playoffs, getting this right and then making a run in the playoffs,” D’Antoni said. “After that, you can panic. But not yet. Panicking doesn’t really help anything. Just hang in there. We’ll get there.”
The Knicks have 12 games remaining before the playoffs, and the team said that’s enough time to fix things.
Even Anthony, who said on Sunday the Knicks might not be fully right until next season, is changing his tune.
“I have faith. I believe,” said Anthony, who has seen the Knicks go 7-9 since his arrival. “We believe that something will turn around quickly.”
Amar’e Stoudemire said the Knicks must have a sense of urgency and start playing better.
“It really boils down to, do we have a choice?” he said. “We don’t have a choice. We have to get it together before the playoffs if we want to make something special out of this year.”
The Knicks have been criticized for their poor defensive play, but the offense has been the culprit, too. They have hit just one field goal in their last 7:25 and have failed to score 100 points during this three-game skid.
D’Antoni said the team doesn’t have the right pace, ball movement or speed with decision making. He likened the team’s problems to the early-season struggles when the Knicks were 3-8, and Stoudemire agreed.
“If you guys can remember, we started the year off this season with a bunch of new guys. We started off I think 3-8 or 3-9 or so,” Stoudemire said. “And then once we figured out the correct spacing and the ball movement and how to space the floor and run the court, then we went on a tear.
“I think it’s a similar situation now,” he said. “We’ve got new guys and we’re kind of starting off a little slow, trying to figure out the spacing and how to run with vision. And once we get that figured out, then we’re going to start rolling.”
Team president Donnie Walsh has been in the NBA a long time, but the Knicks president said it’s rare that he’s made a trade of this magnitude this late in the season. He also said he’s not surprised the trade has disrupted the team’s chemistry.
“I never did it very often, if I had teams that I thought were going to go deep in the playoffs,” he said. “This was the kind of trade where I wasn’t sure we were going to go deep in the playoffs.
“We had an opportunity to get two really good players and so I did it and I think it’s good for the franchise’s future,” he said. “But I knew it would disrupt where we were from the trade deadline on. And I think that’s turned out to be true.”