The Bulls and the Knicks have something in common: They’ve both won a lot of games when the stars of their teams were out with injuries.
The difference? Chicago kept winning when Derrick Rose came back while New York unraveled when Carmelo Anthony returned.
The New York Knicks (18-23) look to find answers to snap a five-game losing streak against the league-best Chicago Bulls (34-9) in Monday night’s best game.
The teams met back on February 2 — two games before the beginning of Linsanity — when Derrick Rose lit up the Garden for 32 points and 13 assists and handed the Knicks a heart breaking 105-102 loss. Amare Stoudemire had 34 points and 11 rebounds, the only game this season in which he had scored at least 30 points.
Rose will get his first look at Jeremy Lin as the new starting point guard of the Knicks, and Ronnie Brewer believes his teammate is up for the challenge.
Chicago continues to face a litany of injuries in the starting lineup. Richard Hamilton has missed 27 games, Rose has missed 10 and Deng eight. Joakim Noah (illness) will play tonight while Luol Deng (wrist), Richard Hamilton (shoulder), and C.J. Watson (ankle) will remain sidelined.
For New York, “Linsanity” has become a thing of the distant past. Since the return of Anthony on February 20, the Knicks have gone 2-7 after the team went on a 7-1 run without him, and a defense that had held opponents to 96.3 points on .447 shooting has evaporated, allowing 100 or more in all but two of the nine games.
The unkind fans of Madison Square Garden showered Anthony — the subject of criticism — with boos during the intros while chanting “Fire D’Antoni” during the loss against Philadelphia.
Lin has struggled in the month of March, averaging 16.4 points on 39.5% shooting and 7.2 assists after averaging 20.9 points on 47.2% shooting and 8.4 assists in February.
J.R. Smith has been unproductive since joining the team on February 17, averaging 9.2 points on just 37% shooting in 22 minutes. He was fined $25,000 by the league for tweeting a wildly inappropriate picture and has become a distraction for the team.
Anthony must have seen it all coming because he was reportedly not in favor of the team signing Smith.
The game will be a homecoming for rookie Iman Shumpert. It remains to be seen how many minutes he will receive as he seems to have fallen into D’Antoni’s doghouse, playing just 5 minutes against Milwaukee and 11 minutes against Philadelphia in the past two games.
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