N.Y.Knicks ~ The Bounces Went Our Way Tonight

NEW YORK KNICKS: 
* Landry Fields Electrifies Crowd. 
** Amar'e Continues To Lead Knicks.
*** "Snarling" Ray Felton Bounces Raptors In Last Seconds.

Final
Toronto Raptors     110
New York Knicks   113

I counted five; Five bounces on the rim, then in...and..the Knicks win.  It was a bad shot but that was because Toronto defended the play well.  Ray had no pass and nowhere to go....but up.  And up it went.  Then down it came and after bouncing around a bit, down it went.  Then after one last shot attempt by the Raptors, victorious, off went the Knicks to their locker room winners of their last 6 consecutive games.

Ray Felton's last second shot gets on ESPN tonight, but he kept things together for the Knicks in the first half snarling the whole time.  But before that, and before Amar'e put the Knicks on his back in the fourth quarter, Landry Fields added his own highlight to the All-Time Sickest Knicks' Slams and Jams moments.  The reDUNKulous Rookie slammed home a Put-Back so viciously, the play would have broken the rest of Bernard King's fingers had he attempted such violence above the rim.

As far as "The Put-Back" ~ there was always Bernard King's put-back versus the Pistons in the playoffs back in the day when he had his fingers all taped up together.  Then there was Patrick Ewing's put-back of a John Starks drive against the Pacers.  Landry Fields' put-back was equally rim rocking, if not spectacular.  Incidentally, it tied the score at 56-56 with just under one minute left in the first half.

Landry's highlight moment wasn't just something to marvel at, it juiced the crowd up exponentially.  The crowd was pretty docile in the first quarter.  And who could blame them.  The Knicks fell behind right from the opening tip allowing the Raptors to get out to a 13-0 lead.   C'mon...The Raptors?

Landry's slam punctuated a 1st half comeback as it not only tied the score, it set the tone for the rest of the game, not to mention setting MSG decibel levels.  That play woke everybody up and the Garden was raucous from that moment on.

It seemed the more the Garden crowd engouraged their team with the customary DE-FENSE chant, the more Toronto's C-Andrea Bargnani kept raining buckets on us.  He would finish the night with 41 points but the crowds efforts would still not go unrewarded.

The fourth quarter appropriately belonged to Amar'e Stoudemire.  Playing with four fouls then getting a fifth foul called against him on a play, I could see ref Dick Bavetta mouth to Amar'e, "You have a point", when the two discussed the foul.

No matter.  He kept his cool and kept scoring buckets.  Eighteen of Stoudemire's thirty nine points tonight came in the fourth quarter.  Add in 14 rebounds and a few blocked shots and what you have is a man carrying his team.  Tonight was the 6th consecutive game Amar'e scored over 30 points.  One more will tie the Knicks' club record for consecutive games of 30+ points.  For Toronto, there was no solution for his slams off the pick and roll, dunks coming from the low post and his mid-range jumper.

After he was done dominating the 4th quarter and Ray Felton ensured we'd gotten a good bounce, the Garden fans emptied out onto 7th Avenue happy their team just won it's 14th game versus 9 loses... And if you were with me, you were talking about that Landry Fields put-back all the way home.




Mike.BTB