NBA NEW YORK — Amare Stoudemire was bouncing around the New York Knicks locker room after his team’s win over the Dallas Mavericks on Sunday, doling out high-fives and congratulating each of his teammates, telling forward Steve Novak, “That’s how you shoot it,” and patting Jared Jeffries on the back with a, “Beautiful game.” Stoudemire’s fellow Knicks received his outsize enthusiasm with smiles and hand shakes. It was as if Stoudemire was using his ebullience to head off potential questions about his limited role (11 points on 4-for-10 shooting) in the win, nipping controversy before it blossomed.
“We are out to win,” Stoudemire said. “That’s the most important factor for us right now, winning and winning and winning. We are doing it by any means.”
Those means, it turns out, could be much different than the ones on which the Knicks thought they’d be relying when the season began. Now, those means probably include more limited production from the team’s two highest-paid players, Stoudemire and Carmelo Anthony, and most certainly include more of an emphasis on point guard Jeremy Lin, along with new shooting guard J.R. Smith and guys like Jeffries and Novak. Lin and Smith were not on the team’s opening-day roster, and Novak was signed four days before the season started.
Knicks players agreed that Sunday was their best performance of the year, one in which six players reached double-digit scoring and the team dished out 21 assists—the fourth time in the last five games they have hit 20 assists, something they did just nine times in their first 27 games.
“I think this is the best team effort we have had all year,” center Tyson Chandler said. “We have individual stars on different nights, but tonight I feel like we were really hitting on all cylinders. We have a bond. You can see it.”
Enter Anthony, back from 14 days off with a groin injury. It’s unfair to assume Anthony will be Kryptonite to the Knicks' new-found chemistry, that he is a square peg in what has become a well-rounded offense. That will take time to determine.
“I don’t know,” guard Landry Fields said. “I don’t want to predict the future. We’ll see how it works when we see how it works.”
Anthony is not coming back to the same team he left. The team he is rejoining wins, wins a lot and does it with Lin making plays in the lane. That means it will take an adjustment on the part of Anthony, who is not the kind of standstill shooter that would normally thrive playing with Lin’s pick-and-roll game.
Anthony has been the offensive focal point nearly every game he has played since high school. Now he will have to be just another part of the team, and he must be willing to take as little as, say, 10 shots on some nights. He did that when helping Team USA to the Olympic gold medal in 2008, but that was playing with LeBron James, Dwyane Wade and Kobe Bryant—can he do the same with Lin, Smith and Novak?
Much of this will fall on coach Mike D’Antoni, who has chosen his words on the matter carefully. He understands that managing egos will be as important as Xs and Os. Anthony is still a premier scorer, and there has to be a way for him to contribute while letting Lin do his thing. Just as important, D’Antoni must make sure Lin does not shrink in the face of Anthony’s star power, that he continues to be aggressive and not over-defer to Anthony.
In other words, D’Antoni has to convince Anthony to adjust to Lin, not vice-versa.
“We should be really good,” D’Antoni said. “We just have to get there. Our chemistry has to get right and everybody has to adjust to everybody. That might not be perfect for the first week, but the potential is there. It is our job as coaches and their job as players to maximize our potential. We have a lot of players, some might not play at the end of the game, some might play 10 minutes, while others might play 20 minutes. We go with the feel.”
Stoudemire, so far, has done that—been willing to adjust to everybody and still be buoyant in the locker room. Now, it’s Anthony’s turn.
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