Nine games remain in this Knicks season, and ennui set in long ago. Whatever potential lay with them has been drained and all that’s left is another countdown to summer.
The Knicks are 14-59, sawed in half by the Nuggets on Friday night. Losses stopped mattering a few months back and they’re far enough behind the field in the race for a 14 percent chance at Zion that there can’t be much fear left that they’ll be caught.
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Their schedule has reached its senseless peak — too far from January to find much meaning, too far from April 10 to see the end. These are the nihilist Knicks, trading up in losses from 36 points in Toronto Monday to 21 to the Jazz two days later and only 18 against the Nuggets on Friday night at Madison Square Garden.
It may feel like malaise has set in but David Fizdale swears it’s nothing more than simple ineptitude.
“Just getting the hell smacked out of us,” the coach said. “Just to really be honest about it. These teams, one, they’re really good basketball teams… So we’re really running into a buzzsaw in this part of the schedule.
Maybe it wouldn’t feel as fleeting if the Knicks were facing like-minded foes. Teams rolling out youth by the bundle, trying to immunize them against the troubles of inexperience and learning where to prune ahead of next season. The Knicks have been in that place for a while. They may well be good next year — if you believe the chatter. They may even be very good next year — if you believe the boasts of James Dolan. Then they’ll need to know who’s good enough to stay and to play when the games are worth something.
Kevin Knox is mired in a weeks-long slump, but better the franchise figure out now what’s a rookie trying to make his way in the NBA and what’s more lasting. Mitchell Robinson has already proven himself worthy of being more than a second-round pick. He’s looked more like a lottery pick than the Knicks’ lottery pick. Allonzo Trier and Dennis Smith Jr. have their strengths and warts, and it’s still uncertain how two high-volume shooters fit when they’re not given carte blanche to make the offense their own.
And there is Frank Ntilikina, who teems with potential but hasn’t yet harnessed it, if he ever will. He is closer to actualizing himself on defense. On offense, he remains placid and too often unproductive. He is also just 20.
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Friday, in his first game back after missing almost two months with a groin injury, he was rusty but got to a familiar stat line: five points, five assists, four rebounds, and somehow an even plus-minus in an 18-point loss. He wasn’t quite himself after such an absence but he played 25 minutes nonetheless, given time to get there.
“I thought he was solid,” Fizdale said. “He made some really good plays off the dribble. He helped people get shots. He defended. Obviously the shooting is always going to be rusty if you’re out that long … I really liked the way he played on and off the ball.”
This has been a disappointing season for Ntilikina, averaging 5.9 points per game and shooting 33.8 percent from the floor. He’s played just 42 games so far. His shooting numbers have dipped. He entered the season divisive among scouts and remains there. He may well one day become an All-NBA team defender, or let gravity take its course on some depth chart. Again, he’s just 20.
Forecasting Ntilikina’s future is no easier now than in October, even as he stays a cause célèbre among Knicks fans. Because of injury and, before that, uneven playing time, he has stagnated from last year, making small growths in one area but slipping elsewhere. He has had to endure change, from a new coach to being asked to play a new position on the wing. Ntilikina has separated from CAA, his former agency. Smith, the point guard taken a pick after him in the 2018 draft, is in New York now, starting.
Still, Ntilikina says it has not been a lost year for him.
“Nothing is lost,” he told The Athletic. “I’ve learned a lot. More than you think while being on the side while also working on my mind. I’ve learned a lot. I think I’ve improved a lot, even things you don’t see. Now I’m just looking what’s ahead of me and I’ll work my ass off to be the best Frank I can be.”
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The Knicks have maintained their confidence in him, though rhetoric has not quite matched action. The Knicks, from coach to front office, insist they are high on Ntilikina, but have acquired Emmanuel Mudiay and then Smith to play point guard over him, and moved him off the position altogether at times.
His path, so far, is not unique. It has been jagged but other lottery picks have taken it before. Mario Hezonja, the fifth overall pick in 2015, sees a comparison to his time with Orlando, which ended after just three years.
Before the season began, he vowed to mentor Ntilikina, hoping to keep him from hitting bottom like he had. Hezonja and Ntilikina sometimes drive into Manhattan together for Knicks home games, talking, as Hezonja counsels him about his game. While Ntilikina sloughs off any hints of frustration, Hezonja can’t help but feel for him the way his season has gone so far.
“Absolutely,” Hezonja said. “Because it happened — the same shit that happened to me. He says, ‘Damn, you talk much.’ Yeah, I do but I’m telling you what I know and what I’ve been through. As long as I can be that negativity control, and positivity, overall, in his ear, I think he can control the situation much better.”
The final nine games will give Ntilikina an opportunity to show himself again, heading into an offseason where the Knicks could shake around their roster. A few weeks won’t be dispositive for him, but it can be enlightening for the Knicks. It can at least serve as an uplifting coda to a long, unfulfilling year.
And Ntilikina says he wants to look forward, to let the past stay there, and move on, focusing on himself and his improvement. Even while out, he asserts, he has become wiser, using his time to watch and learn, in anticipation of his return.
“You see the game on the side,” he said. “You’re learning a lot. You’re watching a lot of film. You’re watching a lot of behaviors. You’re watching not only your team, all the NBA. You’re trying to do something, you cannot play. You’re still trying to learn and improve. That’s my mindset. I’m trying to get better at everything. I was not chilling for this. I did improve.”
(Top photo: Sarah Stier / Getty Images)
