Amar’e Stoudemire took jump shots and participated in dribbling drills, while Iman Shumpert jumped over obstacles and dunked the ball with flair. But yesterday’s workouts for the two injured Knicks did not give them a more definitive date for a return.
“It’s good to see Amar’e back out dribbling the ball and running a little bit,” coach Mike Woodson said as the Knicks prepared for Sunday’s noon matinee against the Suns at the Garden. “[Shumpert] has basically been doing the conditioning and therapy work he needs to do, but he’s still not ready to play basketball.”
The last time Stoudemire took the court was for a preseason game in Montreal on Oct. 19, and the team gave him a six-to-eight-week timetable to return following left knee debridement surgery on Nov. 1. Shumpert still is recovering from May surgery to repair a torn ACL in his left knee.
With the Knicks at 11-4, there is no undue hurry to get either back into the lineup.
“All we can do it take it a day at a time and patiently wait,” Woodson said. “I don’t think either one of them needs to be rushed at this particular time because it is so early in the season.”
* Marcus Camby certainly heard the fans at the Garden chanting his name during garbage time of the Knicks’ 108-87 blowout of the Wizards on Friday, and though it didn’t convince Woodson to put Camby in the game, he appreciates it.
“It’s great to hear 20,000 people chanting like that,” Camby said. “It’s great to hear the Garden faithful behind me.”
Camby has played in just two of the team’s past six games for a combined 10 minutes. Woodson has said he is concerned about the 38-year-old center’s conditioning in his second tour with the Knicks.When asked three successive questions concerning his lack of playing time, Camby each time responded with the team’s record: “Eleven and four.”
***The Knicks came out of Friday’s win averaging the fewest turnovers per game in the NBA (11.40) and fifth in takeaways (16.5).
“If you take care of the ball and you make teams turn the ball over,” Raymond Felton pointed out, “your percentage of winning is great, without question.”