DALLAS — Carmelo Anthony’s postgame behavior was as puzzling as his recent oncourt play.
The Knicks forward scored 6 points in a 2-of-12 disaster and sat and watched the second unit nearly steal a win over the defending champion Mavericks. As a capper, Anthony bolted the locker room early, heading for the bus, saying to a reporter, “Not tonight.’’
Fifteen minutes later, Anthony returned to the locker-room area to speak to a small group of writers and admitted adjusting to the new alignment has him confused on the court.
The Knicks fell to the Mavericks, 95-85, last night to go 2-4 since Anthony returned to a new structure created by Jeremy Lin, whose emergence stoked a 7-0 spurt with Anthony missing most of those games with a groin injury.
“I think any time you go from the early part of the season and having the ball and distributing and now waiting for it to come to me, it’s quite an adjustment for myself,’’ said Anthony, a minus-18 and 0-for-3 from 3-point range.
The Knicks, who fell to 17-19, were spearheaded in the fourth quarter by the subs and Amar’e Stoudemire while an atrocious Anthony and Lin sat on the pine. The Knicks proceeded to scare the defending champions with a ferocious 15-0 run to start the fourth that gave them their first lead since the opening minutes.
But as soon as it got real interesting and Anthony and Lin returned, the defending champs fought back with their own 14-0 spurt, powered by Dirk Nowitzki, who scored 8 points in the game-sealing run and spoiled Tyson Chandler’s return to Big D.
Anthony usually is the last Knicks player out of the locker room after games. Asked why he seemed so upset earlier in leaving quickly for the bus, Anthony said, “We lost. Losses don’t sit well with me.’’
The backup quartet of Baron Davis, Iman Shumpert, Steve Novak and Josh Harrellson teamed with Stoudemire to light Dallas on fire.
Stoudemire, who lost 10 pounds in the past 10 days on a new weight-loss program, drove and rolled in a runner in the lane for a 78-77 lead with 4:55 left to complete a 15-0 run and give the Knicks their first lead since it was 4-3 in the opening minutes. They trailed by 14 points after three quarters.
But they ran out of gas. A fired-up Nowitzki (28 points) hit a turnaround for a 79-78 lead with 4:12 left and ignited the Mavericks to rally with a fury.
Down three, D’Antoni made the tough decision to pull an exhausted Davis and Harrellson, playing his first game since Jan. 21, for Lin and Anthony and the Knicks fell to pieces.
“I thought their energy was great, Novak hit some 3s, we were turning them over, guys got to the rim,’’ D’Antoni said. “I made a switch and it kind of fell apart.’’
Stoudemire had a big game, finally, finishing with 26 points on 10 of 18 shooting. Lin didn’t excel like the last Dallas meeting, scoring 14 points and 7 assists, shooting just 4 of 13 as Linsanity is leveling off.
Now with Stoudemire on the verge of being back, Anthony has to find himself and get out of a season-long funk.
“I think just trying to find the right spots, the rhythm,’’ Anthony said. “Tonight in the second half, we were going to Amar’e and we had it going early. We were looking for that to exploit. As far as me, I’m all right and I’ll figure it out what I have to do and adjust whatever way I have to.’’
Chandler got his championship ring in a pregame ceremony but not the victory and he was largely quiet with 6 points and 8 rebounds, jabbering at the refs, finally picking up another technical foul late in the fourth quarter after he thought his former teammate, Nowitzki traveled on one of his late makes. He signaled for the travel as he waited to check into the game and tapped a referee on the back.
These are no longer the Lin-led Knicks of mid-February that captivated fans around the nation. They have lost five of eight and still trying to fit the new pieces.
“It’s our job to get him better looks,’’ D’Antoni said of Anthony. “It’s a little bit of everything. Roles being defined, coming in and out of the games. We have to do a better job of getting comfortable.’’
Stoudemire says Anthony knows to be supportive of the second unit, which has excelled recently. “Every player has nights like this, he’ll get a chance to redeem himself (tonight vs. San Antonio),’’ Stoudemire said. “The second unit’s playing well and we want to encourage them to keep going.’’
When they had it all down in the chemistry department in February, the Knicks whipped the Mavericks at Madison Square Garden for their seventh straight win under Lin’s direction. They are now a far cry from that team as they have three new pieces trying to fit in, J.R. Smith, who is struggling (1 of 5), Davis, and Anthony.
One of the signature moments of what this team has become occurred late in the third quarter. Smith had the ball deep on the right wing on the break and a wide-open Novak calling for the ball on the left wing. Novak had just hit a 3-pointer moments before and was now open again. Instead of whipping it to the open Novak , the cold Smith dribbled and fired up a contested 3-pointer that clanked the iron.
marc.berman@nypost.com