New York Knicks’ head coach Derek Fisher does not believe in moral victories.
Friday night the New York Knicks lost to the San Antonio Spurs 100-99. It was a loss on the record books but in my opinion it was a good moral victory for a team that won just 17 games last season.
San Antonio is a team that is contending for a title this year and New York hung in tough even though they could have given up in the fourth quarter (something head coach Derek Fisher suggested they did a week ago against the Bulls). Down double-figures in the fourth quarter the Knicks fought back and even gave themselves a chance to WIN the game.
But Fisher is not interested in any moral victories, as per Al Iannazzone of Newsday.
"“First thing was no moral victories,”“We had an opportunity to win the game and we didn’t. Then the second thing was not to allow to walk in there and pat them on the back for getting close as though we weren’t good enough to win the game.”“We came to win. We had a chance to win and we didn’t. But we don’t still get a gold star for getting close. This is not elementary school. This is professional sports.”"
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This sounds all well and good from a player that has won five NBA Championships with the Los Angeles Lakers, but he has to understand that he is coaching a team with much lesser expectations. If he was coaching the Golden State Warriors, I agree there would be no gold star but for the Knicks, maybe there should be. It was good to see New York compete with a Championship-caliber team.
Although Fisher does acknowledge that the team tried their best and left it all on the court.
"“I think we’re getting there. These types of games teach you how much it takes, that you really do have to completely empty yourself in order to be the best. I thought we had a lot of guys that completely emptied themselves out. They couldn’t play harder. They couldn’t do more than what they tried to do. Sometimes you still come up short. We did. We’ll keep working to get better.”"
New York’s superstar Carmelo Anthony agreed with Fisher that the team left it all on the court.
"“We’ll be OK,” “I’ll take a loss like this any day.”"
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Unlike Fisher though, it sounds like Anthony is taking the loss as a moral victory. Although Melo was visibly frustrated at the end of the game.
Anthony had the ball in his as the clock was waning down but three Spurs converged on him, and he was forced to pass the ball to a semi-open Jose Calderon. Semi-open because Manu Ginobili was able to recover late and slightly contest the shot. Calderon missed the game-winning shot, and Anthony questioned his own decision after the game.
"“Did I make the right play? Then after seeing it multiple times after the game, I felt like I made the right play.”"
Fisher immediately came onto the court to console Anthony, presumably to let him know that he made the right play. Which it was because Calderon had a great look from three, and is a great shooter. The Spaniard shoots 46.3% from beyond the arc when the nearest defender is 4-6 feet per NBA.com, and Ginobili was roughly that far.
Despite not completing the comeback, Arron Afflalo feels that the Knicks are headed in the right direction.
"“I think we’re getting better and learning how to compete for 48 minutes,”“That was a weakness of ours in the beginning of the season, closing out games when we had big leads and when teams would make runs on us, not competing to the end, not giving ourselves a fighting chance.”“If there’s anything we can take from that, it’s our ability to compete whether we’re up or down, to build that mental stability that all great teams have.”"
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A week that consisted of a three game winning streak against the Hawks and Heat, and then a one-point loss to the Spurs. I’ll take that, definitely a good week.