Official Knicks at Spurs Game Thread (7:30)
 

7:30 PM CT
TV: FSN

New York (5 - 0)
https://encrypted-tbn1.gstatic.com/i...-k8EgNy3X6PQtO

San Antonio (7 - 1)
FireySpurs

Knicks-Spurs Preview

By PAUL DIGIACOMO
STATS Senior Editor

(AP) -- In order for the New York Knicks to remain the only unbeaten team in the NBA, they'll have to win in a place that has not been kind to them for nearly a decade and defeat a club that continues to amaze in regular-season games.

New York tries to end a nine-game losing streak in San Antonio on Thursday night as it takes on a Spurs squad looking to win for the 18th time in 19 non-playoff contests.

The Knicks opened a three-game trip with a 99-89 victory over Orlando on Tuesday night, improving to 5-0 for the first time since opening the 1993-94 season with seven consecutive wins en route to an appearance in the NBA finals.

New York's success can be attributed to its solid play on both ends of the court, as it is among the league leaders with 103.4 points per game and an average of 87.8 allowed.

The Knicks, who have won each of their games by double digits, held the Magic to 13 points in the fourth quarter after taking a one-point lead into the period.

"Defense, we buckled down," said forward Carmelo Anthony, who scored a game-high 25 points. "We kind of slowed them down, kept them off the glass rebounding. Once we had a chance to rebound the basketball, get out and make some shots, we didn't turn back from there."

Starting guard Raymond Felton had 21 points and reserve JR Smith chipped in with 21 of his own on 9-of-14 shooting. Smith is second on the Knicks with a career-best average of 18.2 points, trailing Anthony's 26.8 per game.

"It's great. It's a great feeling," said Smith, who is 13 for 18 from 3-point range. "We want to keep it going."

Doing so may be tough in San Antonio, where New York has averaged 88.6 points since a 105-97 win March 18, 2003. Plus, the Spurs have jumped out to a 7-1 start after ending the 2011-12 regular season on a 10-game win streak and winning their first 10 in the playoffs before losing four straight to Oklahoma City in the Western Conference finals.

Including playoffs, San Antonio has won 22 of 24 on its own court.

"Road wins are tough to get, so you gotta really be locked in and focused as a unit," said coach Mike Woodson, whose Knicks are in a stretch of playing six of seven away from home. "... The schedule is what it is. We can't run from it."

The Spurs concluded a 3-1 trip Tuesday night with an 84-82 victory over the Lakers as Danny Green hit the go-ahead 3-pointer with 9.3 seconds left.

San Antonio is also one of the better defensive teams in the NBA, holding opponents to 92.6 points per game, and it helped against Los Angeles as the Spurs shot a season-low 38.9 percent.

"That's a great win, we were not playing very well, missed a lot of wide-open shots," said point guard Tony Parker, who scored a team-high 19 points while shooting 8 for 18. "... (Thursday) is going to be a great game, another one."

Is it just me or do the Knicks play better when Stoudemire is out? Both this year and last.

Spurs crush the Knicks tonight and shut-up the big city media bias....at least for one night...lol

Spurs 107
Knicks 91

There's only 3 NBA games tonight. And out of the 3, the Knicks-Spurs games (the one that is not on National TV) features the 2 teams with the best records.

Unlike the 3rd party networks who can choose to show whatever they think will get the highest ratings, I would imagine NBATV has to be equitable to as many teams as possible in the League. Occasionally they let fans vote from a limited selection of games on a certain night and broadcast the winner of the vote. That's how the Spurs/Lakers game was chosen the other night. Why ESPN and TNT chose not to broadcast it, I don't know.

Carmelo has been playing the 4. So get ready for a lot of "small ball BB"

I have no faith in Melo. Make him work for his shots and he'll keep taking them anyway. If the Spur D shows up, the Knicks lose their first game of the season tonight.

Knicks and Clippers are the 2 most dangerous teams in the league right now.

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not necessarily. when we played the Suns in their early running days, we put Bowen on their SF turned PF Marion and put Horry on a spot up shooter (Q-Rich). we also did something similar in 2006 when Horry started vs. the Mavs and put him on Josh Howard while Bowen guarded Dirk.

if Diaw starts, don't be surprised putting him on a Corey Brewer. he's similar to Marion in that he can't really shoot and he's a slasher.

Pop could go small (maybe start Jackson), but that'd sort of deplete our depth and leave a bunch of bigs with DNP's, unless he plays De Colo.

Again!!!!

Our Spurs D will win! :rock

Close very interesting game but Spurs hand the NY their first loss this season!

Spurs 101
Knicks 100

Go Spurs Go

Nail Biter last minute Free Throw by Manu or Tony!:p

Yeah Eddy - Brooklyn and Boston shown on TV here?

Splitter hitting four free throws in a row... is that a Guinness record?

Splitter scoring 12 in a row... is that another Guinness record?

Terrible fourth. That's what happens when u fall for the 3 especially when it wasn't Fallin all game. Timmy sees the ball once in the fourth and Manu is not right at present moment

Spurs should of signed Kidd in 03.

Wow Spurs had the game wrapped in bag with a bow tie ready to go and they let it get away. Ok we need a fall guy to blame. Who was it? I’m going with Pop. I love the guy and wouldn’t want any other coach but why they heck didn’t he let the hot guys finish out the game?

I wouldn't go that far now. They won a few titles after that with a PG of their own. Kidd has shot well against us though no doubt, he can hit that open three.

Hands down it was Manu. Bad shots, bad turnovers, bad management of the offense, and of course bad defense. He's useless out there right now. Probably because of the back, but that's bad news because that won't heal until he can get some good rest.

Yeah thats defintely not good, he might need to miss time like last year to heal. I miss the older Manu, well not the OLDER MANU but the one of old.

Although Manu struggled, and will probably continue to do so until he gets healthy, this game lies totally on Parkers shoulders. He is the one that was running the offense, and never got the Spurs into the right sets at the right time. He also looked like he had a personal thing going trying to match Felton point for point. He took 20 shots to get 19 points. Thats, dare I say, Carmelo-ish. Plus, Felton was getting whatever he wanted while TP was guarding him. One game, and these things happen during the course of the year. I'm sure Pop will use it as a teaching tool. Manu needs to get his back right, for sure. I think he is in the , do I play through it, or do I get some rest and have to play back in to shape later scenario? Btw, where was Neal last night?

TP with 12 assists and 0 turnovers and you want to blame him?

Yep. He had the ball in his hands in second half of fourth quarter. We never got into an offense. He either over penetrated, didn't get the ball in the right spot, or took a quick shot. 3-12 in second half when we were up 12 is pretty self explanatory.

you blame the coaching (cue the "CIA Pop" or "how many rings have you won?" crap posts that come along when the coach fails in a game).

the major part of the loss is the team ran out of gas. the main reason that happened was staying small and helping on Melo EVERY play, we had no legs. all our guys were moving around at every point of the offense and defense. Splitter played well, Pop sat him at the end. Diaw didn't play well, but still could've been a body to spot some minutes.

Manu didn't do anything to cost the Spurs the game when we had the lead neither did Parker. if anyone blames Parker, Duncan, Jackson, Green, or Leonard on plays, watch them again: it was because they were gassed. the only brain fart the team actually had was Leonard helping out for Tony when it was Tim's job and that gave Chandler an easy put back dunk (Leonard was supposed to box out/defend Chandler on that play).

you don't get gassed and blame it on the players, that's the coaching and managing minutes. we all here don't let D'Antoni get away with that when he keeps his short roster, neither should we let Pop escape criticism. it also doesn't matter if Pop has won rings and D'Antoni doesn't, managing minutes is Coaching 101.

Honestly, I would not blame any Spurs player for last night loss.

Most Spurs players OVER Played last night. They not only played but OVER played. They came over zealous and put it all with an attitude if you will...

Manu plays some Glimpses of GREAT D and some few good shots here and there, but his defense is now making up for his offense and let's hope he can become better on offense as he plays more. He needs to play more I would think to get his rhythm back except on the B2B games IMO.

Pop maybe just had to be a bit more aggressive in figuring a way to get Spurs understand the winners MENTALITY plays better vs. PHYSICAL EMPOWERED STUPID CONFIDENT team from NY who won 5 in a row and thinks they are WORLD BEATERS! LOL!
I thought last year in the PO that is what we faced an OKC team that was stupid confident at home and they won 4 in a row then. All mental ala Pop was asking Spurs player this (I want some nasty) . After 20 wins Spurs just got tired and gave up mentally... This comes from lacking experience IMO.

Jason Kidd not making those two Threes, Spurs were the winners. Jason freaking Kidd gets hot when he plays us because he wants to prove that he is better or whatever like that he is feeling that arrogant OLD PG. Can't stand his arse.

So glad we have Tony Parker and Tony played his ARSE off last night and people will still blame him. Unbelievable.

Blame the Refs if you want to believe it or not. I did not like the Refs last night. Some calls were HORRIBLE!

Hope Pop will figure a way to get Splitter more involved earlier in the game. I think one positive thing that is HUGE that I loved watching was Tiago being aggressive and sort of taking over the game. I loved it. Almost did not care if we lose it but I saw the improvement on our team.

It is a learning process for our Spurs they must go through to learn. This loss was needed just so they can learn to play better!

I'll play devil's advocate, mostly because I thought that was a learning game for players and coaches.

You blame gassed players and minutes required by the coach.

10 players were on the clock. None played less than 15 minutes. None played more than 36 minutes (excepting the 2 seconds that Parker played above that number). Overall, if this is the box score seen throughout the season, I don't expect huge arguments. Really, if that's the minute distribution going forward, that's awesome! That's not D'Antoni. Let's stop that argument now.

Maybe this had something to do with coming back from a constant deficit. Spurs looked not so good early. Always trying to match the Knicks. All the energy expended to come back may have something to so with the 'gassed' adjective.
I have an issue with the Spurs only being charged with 10 TOs for the game. Maybe the yahoo! box score only includes the 4th quarter. And Manu's TOs must have all been in the fourth quarter, since he was assigned 3 of the 10.

Coaches overplaying shouldn't be an issue. Minutes don't support it. Unless Manu played all of his 26 minutes in a row, he should be good.
If players aren't in shape for 25-30 minutes a game 10% into the season, then that's on them.

the minutes don't support it, but the box score doesn't always support what actually goes on the court. what about the constant help the Spurs had to use from every possession? Pop started Dejuan Blair on Melo and had to have constant help. After that, whoever was on Melo got help and we were in constant scrambling mode. the box score isn't going to tell you any of that, not even the +/-. this isn't about conditioning either. the teams that run a lot of the time (watch the Lakers this year) aren't going to do much double team scenarios or care about defense, like the Suns of old. they rested a bit on defense while the Spurs of old rested a little each play on offense with it being set up. Melo didn't spend as much energy as the Spurs did on the help. he catches the ball, Blair chases him a little, Duncan helps or Parker/Green do, and Melo kicks the ball out.

we did look good early, but that scheme will only take you so far. also add in to that our smalls playing the 4 had to bang on the inside, which takes a lot out of you especially against 6'10" plus guys. we played the Knicks the same way the whole game while they played the same way the whole game too. what different thing did they actually do?

-Melo got the ball and kicked out, the wing guys helped all around as did Duncan/Splitter/Jackson in the paint. the difference at the end was we were doing the same thing but they ended up making them in the end because guys like Parker and Green were late rotating because of tired legs.

to paraphrase what Shaq said about going from a down low game to a Suns running game, "it takes less of a toll on your body". last night we tried to run on offense and play smash mouth defense, that's a double whammy.

I'm not buying the "they were gassed" argument either. So you're basically saying they should have played Bonner to give these guys a breather?

They played the same way they have been the last couple of years. They were just inefficient on offense. The reason I blame Manu is because he had two key turnovers when the Knicks made their final run, and he took 2 or 3 bad shots that killed any momentum the Spurs had. There were others that missed, but it seemed like Manu was trying to play himself out of a slump or something. That's why Pop pulled him out for Green, although it was too late. So if you want to blame Pop for keeping Manu IN the game, then go ahead.

I would put Diaw in the goat category as well.

I'd say Parker was indeed gassed in the fourth. The clue was that almost all of his shots clanked off the front of the rim which often indicates fatigue. You can look at the minutes and compare them to past games but 30 minutes against one team is not always the same as 30 minutes against another.

you don't buy they were gassed when Parker was breathing heavy and having his arms on his knees during short breaks? Pop kept the same rotation the whole game to say that they were tired should be a non issue.

i was BEGGING for a Bonner sighting, but Pop apparently saw small ball and Jackson's intangibles as necessary to keep him out there at the 4. he's a better help defender than Bonner too. Splitter played well and Pop didn't play him over Jackson or over Duncan during the late minutes, that's something also.

Pop saw a rotation he liked and he kept it, then he saw a lineup he liked and he kept it. they lost their legs playing intensely at both ends of the floor. on one fast break opportunity, Duncan didn't even run back because he was so tired and that's nothing Duncan rarely does.

I think the team appeared to be gasses, and the Knicks are a serious team. I expect closers to close the game, and they didn't. This will happen in an 82 game season, especially when the closers are over 30. I think Manu is still tender and it maybe nice to plug in Nando a little more, and take Manu out if he's not playing well.

I felt good watching the game last night to see those mighty Knicks Facing Reality next eve = Last night where Knicks LOST their first season game on the road at MEMPHIS (Memphis 105 Knicks 95!!!:D

So that tells me on a B2B those mighty Knicks were gassed out at the end of our game because of our pretty good D. :p

Go Spurs Go