Knicks Pulse Check Part IV: Time to Panic?

If Rome wasn’t built in a day, then it probably couldn’t be destroyed in a day, but telling Knicks fans to remain patient after losing three of their last five games is a task too difficult, even for Julius Ceasar.

Despite an absolute beatdown of the Milwaukee Bucks on Sunday, there are legitimate reasons to be concerned about this team. Although I still believe they will win 50+ games and probably finish somewhere between the second and fourth seed in the Eastern Conference, I’d be hard-pressed to favor the Knicks in a seven-game series against the Boston Celtics or Cleveland Cavaliers.

As we’ve seen of late, the Knicks have struggled with beating the elite teams in the NBA. According to The Athletic’s James Edwards III, the Knicks have not been able to win against the top two teams in either conference.

The reasons for this range anywhere from lack of depth, to players underperforming, fatigue, or some combination of the three. As is customary with the NBA Twitter, the coach—in this case, Tom Thibodeau—has received most of the blame for the team’s recent slide. And while he is not without fault, there is an accountability issue that is emerging within the starting five (more on that later).

With all of that said, the Knicks are 12 games over .500, sitting at 26-14, good enough for third place in the Eastern Conference, just behind the Celtics, and in front of the Orlando Magic.

A trip over to Advanced Stats Island shows us that the Knicks rank third in offensive rating (one spot down from our previous check-in), fifteenth in defensive rating and fifth in net-rating (both same spots from previous). The orange and blue are also fifth in assists/turnover ratio (2.07) and second in true shooting percentage (60.3%).