Season On The Line
There’s no bigger swing in a 7 game series than game 4 when you’re down 2-1. You win tonight and tie things up at 2 and you basically reset the entire series. Lose tonight and you’re down 3-1 and you’re season is all but over. Its the same for every post season series, but its never been more true than tonight with the Knicks. They’ve been fighting through shooting slumps and sloppy play. If they pull even tonight they buy themselves some more time to heat up again and turn back into Dr. Jekyll. If they continue to struggle in the same fashion they have and trail 3 games to 1, its a wrap on the season. Takes an incredible amount of focus and discipline to battle back down 3-1 and thats not exactly the Knicks’ strong points.
The bickering needs to stop. Literally everyone on the court needs to bounce back from their game 3 performance. There’s no pointing fingers after a game like that – nobody is in any position to talk shit. Felton needs to bounce back and penetrate. Shump’s knee is a concern but hopefully he can go. JR Smith needs to attack the hoop again and get back to the free throw line. Hopefully Chandler can reverse the clock and revert back to that Defensive Player of the Year type from the regular season. Woodson too. He needs to have more control and say over this team. If adjustments need to be made, he’s gotta make those decisions and enforce them. But…as always…for the 50th time…it all comes down to Melo. Needs to put this team on his back tonight. Its the same story every night, but theres no other way to put it and he has yet to really do so when it mattered. Time to earn it, Melo.