NEW YORK – Josh Hart didn’t mince his words about how the Knicks got off to a terrible start Thursday night against the Golden State Warriors and ultimately found themselves facing another loss.
“We played bad,” Hart said.
That sums it all up.
Hart and the Knicks ultimately lost 110-99, shooting 36.8 percent for the night and making just 12 of 39 from beyond the arc.
It was the Knicks’ second straight loss and seventh in their last nine gamesa streak that comes on the heels of a nine-game winning streak that had the city dreaming of what spring could look like with this team.
But now these Knicks are exhausted, suffering from injuries from some of their biggest weapons. Suddenly, nothing comes so easily.
Now the big question is whether the Knicks can get through this before finding themselves in a more perilous position in the playoffs.
They still own the fourth seed in the Eastern Conference, but they are also just one game ahead of the seventh-seeded Orlando Magic.
Bad start against the Golden State Warriors proved costly
This one felt over from the start after the Knicks missed their first nine shot attempts until Donte DiVencenzo ended the drought with a layup at the 6:34 mark. At this point, the Knicks were already in a 14-point gap.
But the Knicks continued to claw and a three-pointer from the right corner by Jalen Brunson with just under three minutes left in the third quarter brought the Knicks within six, bringing the Garden crowd to its feet.
Then the Warriors began to rebuild their lead, a three from Klay Thompson and a jumper from Chris Paul giving Golden State a 15-point lead with 10:34 remaining.
The Knicks clawed back again and cut it to single digits, but they couldn’t complete the comeback with Golden State pushing its lead back to double digits again in the final minutes on the verge of handing the Knicks a loss.
“They hit us hard,” coach Tom Thibodeau said. “They came out in transition, got some easy baskets and we had to fight to fill a big hole, which we ended up doing. But the first five or six minutes obviously weren’t the best, but after that , I thought we played a good game. a really good job.”
The Knicks’ road ahead: Cleveland, No. 2 seed in the East
It also won’t get much easier anytime soon. The Knicks play Sunday at Cleveland, which has the No. 2 seed in the East, before four straight home games against the Hawks, Magic and Sixers (they face Philadelphia in back-to-back games) before a road trip to the coast west.
“We’re on Cleveland, that’s for sure,” said Brunson, who finished with 27 points on 11-of-25 shooting against the Warriors. We clearly need to be better. “We can certainly learn from our past. We can be upset for the rest of the day, until we fall asleep. But tomorrow morning, we will have to focus on the next one. Keep our morale up, keep our confidence. We all have to work hard individually to be confident. Just show up the next day ready to go, keep trusting yourself and keep chipping away. You can’t hit home runs all the time, just keep hitting singles.
The Knicks received some good news Thursday when OG Anunoby, who was out after having a bone fragment removed from his elbow, was cleared to work on the court. Still not cleared for contact, Anunoby still has a few hurdles to overcome before returning to the game.
“The good thing is he was cleared today,” Thibodeau said. “Now you move on to the next phase. He will be examined daily by our medical staff and then we will go from there. This next step is the most important. Once the contact is added, it will then be ready to go.
It can’t come soon enough for these depleted Knicks, who are also without Julius Randle (shoulder) and Mitchell Robinson (ankle) indefinitely.
The hope is that they all return before the end of the regular season.
The hope is that once the playoffs begin, the Knicks will be whole and a dangerous threat to come out.
Until then, there is uncertainty.
Where will the Knicks be once they are whole again?
“We’re confident,” said Isaiah Hartenstein, who was recently hampered by an Achilles soreness. “We had a little stretch even after that when we were playing well. Then we had more injuries and then a whole bunch of guys were out. And some matches where it was close at the end. Then this last part was a little more difficult. But again, we have enough guys here. We are confident in it until everyone comes back.
