Wednesday 13 February

Last night at MSG the New York Knicks took on the Philadelphia 76ers. This Knicks team has the franchise record for consecutive losses and they were playing a 76ers team with multiple All Stars. The result was never in doubt. 

As a Knicks fan it’s hard to see the team lose so often, the end result might be a high lottery pick (there is no guarantee of a number one pick) but that feels like a very long way away from now. 

I have a very real concern about player development. Last night’s game showed some moments of great play from Kevin Knox (rookie), Damyean Dotson (rookie) and Dennis Smith Jnr (2nd year). However, the constant losing can’t be good for morale and there is more than enough evidence of sloppy mistakes to make you question how much they are focusing on the fundamentals. 

At times it almost felt that the will to tank was so strong it was effecting the 76ers (many of whom have experience of tanking or ‘trusting the process’ as they euphemistically referred to it). At certain points in the game the most effective element of the Knicks defence was the 76ers offence. The 76ers have talent on the team but the second night of their back-to-back (which started with a loss to the Celtics) seemed to leave them tired and a little bit off their usual form.  

The MSG crowd, that only four nights before had been chanting for Zion, were getting energised by the moments of good offence and good blocks and was really willing the team to finally win a game. 

The Kevin Knox dunk over Ben Simmons is definitely my highlight play of the year and Mitchell Robinson’s double double was encouraging. However, DeAndre Jordan had a poor night (compared to his previous games as a Knick) and Kevin seemed to struggle against the 76ers defence.