Matchup: Knicks (10-9) @ Hornets (13-5)
Off Efficiency: Hornets 103.6(15th), Knicks 107.7 (6th)
Def Efficiency: Hornets 98.4(2nd), Knicks 105.9 (19th)
Thanks to the amazing Dariusz Ejkiewicz for the Game Day Banner.
The theme of the night will be conflicting styles, as the Knicks bring their fast paced offense (2nd fastest) to New Orleans (4th slowest). The Knicks come in having won their last five road games, and four in a row against New Orleans.
Even though the Knicks roster is almost entirely different every year, the team still scares me. Not in the same way that Michael is scared of OKC, but more in the way that I’m scared of termites. I know that if I just execute a proper strategy they won’t be a problem, but sometimes that just doesn’t happen, much like the Hornets sometimes just don’t show up against the Knicks.
For the Hornets to be successful they are going to have to control the tempo and play their half court game. Once in the half court they need to find a combination of players that can effectively check the the pick and roll. If they start trying to gun with the Knicks it’s could be a long night.
Raymond Felton and Amare’s execution on the pick and roll has progressed tremendously since training camp. It’s a huge part of why the team has been successful and why they will probably continue to be going forward. As we know, a great pick and roll is nearly impossible to stop. Felton to Amare is starting to look like something pretty fantastic, so keep an eye on that.
Here’s a sweet pick and roll-
Injuries:
Hornets: Pops (out- right elbow infection), David West (out- stomach virus)
Knicks: Azubuike (out- knee), Turiad (questionable- sore knee)
New Orleans Inactives:
Knicks Inactives:
Positional Analysis
PG: Chris Paul v Raymond Felton
Advantage: Hornets
Felton is having his best year ever, quite literally looking like a superstar. He’s been so good that he’s got Larry Brown pining for him over in Charlotte, and fans wondering why MJ let him go. His turnovers are up a bit, but that’s to be expected when transitioning to a fast paced offense.
SG: Marco Belinelli v Landry Fields
Advantage: Hornets
Everybody is all of a sudden in love with Landry Fields (EC Rookie of the Month), but I’m nto sold yet. I’ll take Marco’s defense and superior shooting until Landry proves me wrong. If Marco is on Landry defensively he needs to keep him off the glass.
SF: Trevor Ariza v Wilson Chandler
Advantage: Knicks
This should be an interesting match up, with Chandler having the advantage inside and Ariza outside. Both are good defenders so I wouldn’t think either will have much offensive output, but it should still be a fun battle to watch. All of a sudden it looks like Chandler has turned in to a shot blocker, so keep an eye on that to see if it’s real or just a result of a small sample size.
PF: David West v Danilo Gallinari
Advantage: Hornets
Two very different players should produce some interesting possessions on both ends. It’s not really clear who is going to be guarding who to start the game, but if West is on Gallinari he’s going to try to go inside, and on the other end Gallinari will spend most of his time on the perimeter. It’s possible West will switch over to Chandler at times leaving Gallinari to Ariza.
C: Emeka Okafor v Amare Stoudemire
Advantage: Knicks
Last year Amare abused the Hornets front court when he was with the Suns. Whie the Hornets defense is largely revamped, the advantage that Amare has over Okafor is pretty big. Look for the Knicks to go to Amare inside early and often, and for the Hornets to try and find a way to help Okafor once Amare catches it. One advantage Emeka does have is on the boards, so at the bare minimum he needs to win that battle.
Bench
Knicks: Tony Douglas, Roger Mason, Bill Douglas, Ronny Turiaf, Timofey Mozgov
Hornets: Jason Smith, Jarrett Jack, Willie Green, Marcus Thornton, Pondexter, Pops, Mbenga
Advantage: Hornets
Vegas Zone-
Points- Hornets are giving up 6.5 and bettors are split 50-50.
Money line- Hornets are -280. Knicks are +240.
Over/under- 204 with 85% taking the over. I like the under here.
Fuel for the Fire– Does anyone else remember when Chris Paul demanded a trade? I don’t, and find it pretty absurd that actual newspaper writers are reporting that he did. Cite your source, please. This guy, Ebeneezer, is a real scrooge-
But is Raymond Felton the point guard the Knicks really want? The 26-year-old may be reminded that he’s a mere consolation prize Friday night in New Orleans, when he goes head-to-head with Hornets guard Chris Paul.
Why? Because shortly after Donnie Walsh signed Felton in July, Paul demanded a trade from New Orleans, listing Broadway as a preferred destination.
Notes From the Arena (or maybe beforehand)-
- David West is out with a stomach virus.
- Jason Smith is starting for the fourth time in his NBA career and the first time with New Orleans.
Joe will be on ESPN’s Daily Dime Chat throughout the game, so come over and represent the Hornets fan base.
And check out Knickerblogger.net for their coverage on tonight’s game.
42 says to Support the Team!
58 responses to “Game On: Knicks @ Hornets”
Hornets all the way tonight, btw when you said Termites that rang a bell for me, if any loyal hornets fans need help I work for Terminix!! Now back to the hornets, I hope our Buckets gets a big game in tonite!
Raymond Felton is playing great ball for the Knicks and to me he looks like the answer for them at PG. Tough and plays well with Amare. Should reduce some of the Chris Paul to the Knicks hysteria.
Hope Marco gets his stroke back tonight and that Monty stays with him longer. He is streaky. But so are many great two guards. Some guys dont’ get it going for weeks. Kobe Bryant this year is shooting around 40% FGs and 31% threes.
It’ll be interesting to see how Coach uses Ariza’s defense and how much he’ll swap the player Ariza’s assigned to guard. Switching it regularly could be an interesting way of confusing their offense.
Actually, Gallinari is the SF and Chandler is the PF, despite what their respective heights may imply.
i think joe is probably aware of this and was just saying what the matchup would be. Yea gallo and wilson both play the 3 and they leave the paint to amare, so I think Monty would be wise to matchup gallo with David.
And regarding felton Ive always been one of his fans, love his style of play, pushes the ball extremely well and unfortunately for him he was stuck in Charlotte with next to no-one to push to. Im glad he has Amare to play the pick n roll game with and shooters like gallinari, mason and walker. I did love seeing him and CP in the backcourt in the rookie sophomore games throwing alleys to each other
I just put down what it says on the chalk board.
Did anyone hear anything about a D West injury? A friend at oschner said he was checked in an hour ago? I hope he was wrong.
West is out for tonight’s game.
Anyone know if you can catch the game online? Hardly get to watch being in Houston
http://www.atdhe.net always helps
frontrow.net
Thanks zolinho!!! Good looking out eh
[…] to the game Joe Gerrity outlines that the teams have juxtaposing paces leading us to wonder who will control the tempo? The Knicks […]
is it true that west wont play tonight
Looks like there is a good chance we will get to see Anderson in action tonight with D-West and Pops out.
what type of injury does west have? also the defense is looking bad so far.
As a Chicagoan, I hate any team from New York, but A’mare is one of my favorite big men. I’m torn. 🙁
ariza is lookin good
do my eyes deceive me or did mbenga make two FTs?
is the word pass in willie’s vocabulary?
Willie Green is Pargo’s twin. Loves to shoot. Has the ability to score. But also coughs the ball up a lot.
So far so good. But don’t know if my opinion will change as the year continues…..
I really like marco’s defense.
Willie Green is like a black hole.
“Willie Green is a black hole.”
fixed 😀
Is it just me or do you think Chris Paul is thinking about his leg a little and not being as aggressive. I mean obviously right now you don’t him to attack all the time, but the past week or so he has seemed a lot less aggressive do you think it has something to do with his injury?
if the hornets win this game i think it will make the team get some of their fire back, bc they’ll have been without their second best player and that will show a lot of resiliency.
thekeymaster, I definitely agree. Winning tonight with out Dwest proves a lot
also as far as this game is concerned the refs are letting amare do whatever he wants and by extension so are the hornets. chris needs to look to score in the 2nd half.
also why has jack played more than cp3 so far? is chris hurt?
Watchin the game on League Pass not a great first half for the Hornets BUT the BADASS fact of the night I heard from the NY announcers: Willie Greens’ dad is the drummers for The Neville Brothers!!! IS that awesome or what?!?
Why has Jack, a 36%* shooter, tried 6 shots while CP3 has 2? Why does Jack have 15 minutes while CP3 has 13? Why oh why would you have Jack ever on the floor to close out qtrs? Poor coaching.
Impressive job by J. Smith.
Amare goes for 50? lol
In addition Willie Green sucks. MT5 is better.
*25% with the Hornets
I think that Monty wants Paul to rest to be active in the second half, I think that if we want Paul to play 32-34 minutes in the regular season and want to close the games this is the best tactic available, less minutes in the first half (especially if the game is in control) and more on the second.
Doesn’t matter right now. Chris is disinterested and doesn’t want to attack the paint. Right now he’s not the best point guard in world. Which is sad because he can be when he wants.
omg willie green sucks donkey balls
How many turnovers have we had in this game? We beat ourselves. I mean, multiple 3 second violations!?! Seriously?
man the hornets are sucking it up
I think the hornets D isn’t actually as good as it looks on paper bc they play such a slow pace and that makes the opponents points per game go down. Also if they were a good defensive team they would actually try and get a hand in a someones face when they’re shooting a 3 and cause some damn turnovers. Also the more i watch cp3 play the more i think he isn’t invested in this team at all and it seems to me that he is almost sabotaging them but then again i could just be bitter and paranoid.
wow this is pathetic i’m done paying attention to this team for at least 2 weeks
Man that Knicks team is really really good.
I’m sorry to say it, but this is game is horrible, one of the worst
Never gonna have good attendance if we play like this in front of a home crowd. No one wants to pay to see this. Even if we come out with the win, which is doubtful.
Dude!!! I just bought $1000 worth of Hornets tickets!!!!! Noooooooo!!! I want to see Jack play 15-20 minutes and Willie Green as the first option off the bench!!!!. Please CP3 when I fly half way around the world to see the game only take 2 first half shots.
Well that was painful to watch.
I can’t believe it, it looked like we were trying to lose the game. Why not play Smith when he was doing so well? Why wait so long for Paul to come back in the game when we are down? Appaling substitutions by Monty once again.
I have to agree. Once again rotations lost a game for us!!!!
I have to disagree. It didn’t matter who was on the course cause nobody was playing defense. Monte has his lineup set and it’s not changing. Now that players have earned Montes minutes they know he’s not going to take them out so why try on defense? Monte has to be much more assertive in his coaching. When a player makes a defensive mistake take him out. He’ll learn not to make those mistakes. If a player takes a bad shot, so be it. But there can NOT be defensive lapses and Monte is allowing it.
CP can play more. Some here will probably say he can’t being his knee is about to fall off and everything but he can play more. Monty’s substitutions are starting to suck. 19 games in we should be getting better. Not worse. Let’s GEAUX!
This game shows how much DWest helps the team. I wish they would had won, but Dwest is a HUGE part of this team. J Smith is decent backup PF, and he tries to play well but he isn’t a starter by any means. Marco couldn’t hit a shot to save his life. I really thought CP3 was going to slap Mek during the 3rd quater. Mek really needs to handle the ball better, and dunk it with some power. It’s like he’s afraid of the ball sometimes. All in all, I’ll deal with this lost and look forward to the Spurs next. I hope DWest is healthy by Sunday’s game.
West is indeed a huge part of this team. CP has called him his 17ft assassin. He takes some of the pressure off of CP. CP and West are probably the only Hornets that get double teamed.
I don’t get why the Hornets aren’t running out on 3s?!?!?!?! The Spurs do NOT let teams take 3s. They chase them off and rotate. I haven’t seen one good rotation all game long. They’re doing a terrible job of immating the Spurs. The pick and roll defense has been horrible the whole game also. There needs to be a help defender on Stoudamires catch! Montes strategy to switch the pick and roll should never be tried again. EVER! Okafor is never going to guard a PG effectively EVER! So Monte… DON’T DO IT! That’s all I have for defense. On offense there is 3 minutes left in the game and Chris is walking the ball up the court down by 10. I haven’t seen him attack once in the last couple weeks. He just prances around the perimeter, runs the clock down, then passes it off for a low percentage shot. The Hornets as a team need to stop worrying about keeping the pace so slow. The point at which a shot goes up in the shot clock does not dictate your defense on the other end so please jog the ball up the court get right into the offense and take the first good shot. Then hustle back and play your butts off on defense. This team is playing uninspired and the last couple weeks CP hasn’t cared whether they’ve won or lost. It’s pathetic. Having said that it’s more Montes fault than the players. Somebody has to get in CPs face and tell him to get into the offense right away and jog the ball up. That same person has to get on the players when they make terrible defensive plays. It’s on Monte
Why do they need to get in CP’s face if you already know he’s disinterested? LOL.
CP and the rest of the team probably wasn’t inspired after finding out Chouest probably won’t buy the team now. Was Chouest even at the game tonight?
CP and some others probably want to be traded kind of like Ray Allen and Rashard Lewis did when they found out the Sonics could be headed to OKC. LOL!!
This has nothing to do with Chouset. Shinn is doing just fine as an owner and the NBAs talk to buy the team is to try to quicken the sale to a person that wants to keep the Hornets in New Orleans, probably Chouset.
About CP… Trust me, someone getting in his face will make him very interested. When he’s trying to prove something to the world he’s at his best. He has drive on offense and he’s always moving. Right now he just stands, walks around, and waits. Chris can handle criticism. He’s not fragile and right now he needs it.
I remember at the beginning of the season the Hornets were like 2nd in the league in not allowing 3’s. They let the Knicks have their way tonight though.
They probably won’t beat the Spurs on Sunday either.
LOL. Look at poor Aaron Gray on that banner. He looks so happy and dude never even gets to play. LOL.
I think this is a huge dagger in your hypothesis that Dariusz is a witch doctor lol
He’s happy because the photographer promised him a bucket of chicken for a smile. 🙂
I’m starting to feel like other fans, that CP3 is becoming more and more disinterested. If he gets someone open, they just miss it. If he passes Mek the ball in the paint, he just jumps off one leg off balance and throws it up with one hand. I can see why he isn’t as “aggressive”, what’s the point? Why risk getting injured again, when the team is out of sync. Monty needs to work on his rotations, but he’s a rookie coach, he’ll get it sooner or later (I hope).
He can create shots for himself which he isn’t doing. Ariza and Belli knock down shots when they’re open but Chris isn’t doing it for them. As for rotations, coaches cannot be set on a rotation. Byron was very set on his. Look at the best coaches in the league. Poppavich, Phil Jackson, and Sloan. All three of them have tentative rotations but the flow of the game and how the player is doing determines their lineups, not already set in stone rotations. A coach has to be flexible and they have to demand toughness and aggressiveness from their bench. Poppavich and Sloan do this very well and they always have a slew of guys on the bench that are willing to come in and play hard to get minutes cause they know if they don’t play with passion they’ll be sitting down. Set rotations takes a lot of the motivation a bench player has because he knows he’ll get minutes regardless. Coach Pop and Sloan do this extremely well. (not sure about Phil Jackson. How do you even analyze that guy. He’s so weird)