Game 8 Preview: Knicks and Hawks Part 2

After losing in Atlanta on Saturday night, the Knicks return back to New York, and bring the Hawks with them. The Knicks looked like a very good basketball team on Saturday for the first half. In the second half however, they reverted back to looking like they had never played basketball before. It was extremely disheartening to see, especially with the way the team is playing as whole right now.

Iman Shumpert might be the Knicks best player right now. He was outstanding in Atlanta on Saturday scoring 19 points on 8-12 shooting and dished out a team high 7 assists. Tim Hardaway Jr. didn’t have his best shooting game, but the sophomore provides the Knicks with some solid scoring from the perimeter. Amar’e Stoudemire continues his valuable play off the bench scoring 14 point with 9 rebounds in 21 minutes on Saturday. Even J.R. Smith looked good with 8 points, 5 rebounds, and 5 assists on 4-8 shooting. So where lies the Knicks problems?

Defense. The Knicks are playing atrocious fundamental defense. I have never seen a team lose track of a shooter like the Knicks do. Kyle Korver torched the Knicks for 27 last game, including 6-9 from downtown. If the Knicks do not make a better effort to know where he is tonight, they will most likely see the same results. The Knicks did however play well enough interior defense to hold Paul Milsap to 3-11 shooting, and Al Horford to 3-13 shooting. Tonight New York will need a complete defensive effort.

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We’ve seen the Hawks already this week, so we know what to expect from them. Jeff Teague is a scoring point guard and has the ability to get into the lane relatively easily. Shumpert will need to keep the point guard in front of him and make him a jump shooter to win this game. Korver is an incredible shooter and has to be denied the ball at all times. Milsap and Horford probably won’t have that poor of an offensive showing in back-to-back games, so the Knicks cannot take them lightly.

It all comes down to the third quarter. The Knicks have been killed all year long in this category, and they were just as bad last year in the third as well. Small ball against Atlanta seemed to work last time in the first half, so look for Derek Fisher to use Melo at power forward again tonight.

What To Watch For…

• Melo Shooting Woes
  • The Knicks reverted to last year’s strategy of playing Carmelo Anthony at power forward for most of the game. It didn’t appear to hurt the Knicks defensively, but it certainly didn’t help Melo offensively as he was only 8-20 from the field. That puts Anthony at 26-84 on the four game losing skid. Will he ever shoot his way out of this slump?
• Small Ball
  • The three guard front of Shane Larkin, Shumpert, and Hardaway seemed to work offensively as the trio combined for 33 points. Defensively, too many times there were shooters left wide open and it hurt the Knicks. Interior wise, the Hawks big men really struggled. Can Melo handle the workload down low for another game?
• Free Throw Disparity
  • The Hawks took 36 free throws last game and the Knicks took only 11. This has been a recurring problem with the Knicks as they have become a jump shooting team. If Melo wants to get his shot going again, he needs to find his way to the basket for layups and get to the line. The Knicks are not a good enough shooting team to settle for 18-20 footers instead of driving to the hoop.

The Knicks have lost four in a row and get a chance at redemption for this weekend’s implosion. Will they pull it off, or continue to disappoint? Something has to change in order for them to get back on track. Now’s the time to put a full game together for once.